It is officially a rough draft!

So if you follow me on Twitter you may already know this, but I spotted my muse running in an open field. With a well aimed arrow I crippled the fleeing bastard and dragged him kicking and screaming to my cave. I used two chains this time....

I wanted to turn Hunter's Reckoning into a first person short-story that is actually something I would want to compile into an e-book. Following an exhaustive few hours, the end result was a horrid but complete almost 8000 word short story. Not too shabby for a much shorter "outline". In the end it is a first draft and has permission to suck!

It was mostly painless. I added to the plot a bit and assured the story came full circle in a believable way. The most difficult part of this ordeal was changing from my typical third person point of view past tense to a first person present tense .

Example:

My normal: The hunter looked at the barmaid, she smiled at him but he was not here to be cordial and he turned his glare away as he took a seat.

The change: I look at the barmaid. She smiles at me and I avert my eyes, walking pass her to seat myself.

Not too hard in that very simple, rough sample. But getting into the flow of writing and switching into first person past tense was too easy. I continually had to work to keep myself in the right mindset and using the correct words.

I found an interesting site that talks more of first person present tense here. I agree that it puts the reader in the story and literally in the action, but as a complete change from my comfort zone, it does not make the writing process any easier!

Has anyone else tried their hand at writing in a drastically different tense than their norm? Do you have any tips to switching from one way to the other?

Let me know in the comment section below!

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