Point-of-view preference?

[konstantya]

As will sometimes happen, my inner Hopeless Romantic works its way around the Angsty Cynic, and I've had a hankering for some romance novels.  Sex in stories is often superfluous to me, so I tend to gravitate toward YA romance simply because they can't put all that sex in, and it's more about romantic/sexual tension and plot.  (Well, I want to believe the plot would have to pick up the slack, but often times that's not the case, and I become a sad, jaded reader who goes back to her angst and cynicism.  Anyway.)  I've been browsing amazon and whatnot, reading excerpts and such, and I've realized that, on the whole, I don't think I like stories written in first-person.

I guess the problem I have with them is that they so often read like someone's diary.  And unless you've managed to make that diary awesome/funny like Are You There, God? It's Me, Margaret, or even The Princess Diaries (which I did read, years ago, yes), it comes off as very...it's like narratorial masturbation, I guess.  And when the narrator is a proxy/fantasy for the author (ahem, Twilight?), this goes, in turn, from narratorial masturbation to authorial masturbation.  Putting it in third-person limited would at least let me pretend that you have some distance from this character.  Maybe this just has to do with bad authors vs. good authors when it comes down to it.  And perhaps in first-person stories the flaws are more noticeable?  Or maybe I'm just super-picky with my romances?  (Note:  I am.  I admit it.)  Maybe it has something to do with first-person romances reminding me of my 13-14-year-old self who wrote really bad Mary-Sue first-person romances.  (I actually found some of those while cleaning last summer.  I tried reading them and went, "Wow, that's a weird, icky feeling.")

Not that I haven't enjoyed any stories/books in first-person.  The Great Gatsby and...this other one by this popular YA author...forget his name, but I think the book was called Carl?  I read it a long time ago, but it stuck with me for some reason...[/memory fail]  Anyway, those two come to mind immediately.  And I think what does it for me with those examples is that the story is not really about the narrator, even though he/she is an actual character in the story.  In The Great Gatsby, Nick is, essentially, a secondary character--he exists mostly so we can see things through his lens of sight.  And now that I think about it, the one first-person fic I wrote is much the same thing; it's more about the Turks, than Reno.  Arguably the real focus in that one is Vincent.

I think I write in third-person less because of the omnipresence, and more for the distance it allows.  My style does tend to be on the detached side.  Sort of a "here are the facts; think what you will" way of doing things.  Not that omnipresence (or the limiting of it) doesn't have its draw--indeed, many of my longer stories which will maybe one day see the light of the internet? maybe? play with that very idea--limiting the perspective to one or two characters for effect and/or story-telling purposes.  Like, you don't need first-person to have an unreliable narrator, you know?

So, maybe all that wasn't as cohesive or concise as it could have been, but I've wasted enough time on this already today.  ^^'  My question is, do you have a preference for third- or first-person point-of-view?  If so (or not), why is that?  Just what exactly about them do you prefer?  And does this preference vary depending on whether you're reading or writing?  I'm sure there are other reasons beyond my personal ones (and no doubt my personal reasons at this moment are tainted by amateur-ish romance novels), so I'm curious.

Comments

[konstantya.livejournal.com]

Ooh, awesome--thanks for the rec! And I might have read one of those renditions of Beauty and the Beast, actually... Retellings of fairytales are something I have a great interest in, and I read more than a few good ones, back in the day. I should look those back up, truly.

I've heard of The Left Hand of Darkness, but the premise doesn't do much for me, I'm afraid... Or, rather, it's something I would probably find interesting, but I feel it's far too thinky when I'm in the mood for (relatively) light romance. It's one of those that's on my list for when I want a Serious Book. XD

I'm actually more into historical than sci-fi or fantasy, really (but if there's old-school science involved, that's the best!), but it's often hard to find historical romances that have more than just period clothes and societal scandals to root them in the past. There was actually a great rec I came across a while ago, that was as much about the Napoleonic Wars as it was a romance, and I always kick myself for not writing it down because I have a huge wooden ship fetish and men in old military uniforms = yes.

I think we go about things in the opposite ways--I almost never write something where the romance is the main focus, but I feel the need to get my fix by reading it. I'd probably have more luck with fanfiction in this respect if I wasn't such a stickler for characterization and/or if my personal head-canon wasn't so strongly rooted.

And I was pretty sure you'd love the laser game, so you're very welcome. XD