juliamariesparrow: Hi! To learn to write better, I read and analyze really good author's novels, and I'm doing that with The Graveyard Book. In the first chapter, it looks like you used 1st, 2nd, and 3rd persons, but I can't figure out why it worked. Because it did! And it's something that none of my writing teachers taught me how to do or talked about (except to say don't do it, which books say, too), so can you explain why it worked, please? I'm stumped. Thanks!
neil-gaiman:
I’m glad it worked for you. As I said, in the last and the most important of my eight rules for writing,
- The main rule of writing is that if you do it with enough assurance and confidence, you’re allowed to do whatever you like. (That may be a rule for life as well as for writing. But it’s definitely true for writing.) So write your story as it needs to be written. Write it honestly, and tell it as best you can. I’m not sure that there are any other rules. Not ones that matter.