Coby raised her eyebrows. "And yet you read Divergent."
"I wanted to give it a try before the movie. Borrowed it from the library. I heard the third book alternates POVs and they're virtually indistinguishable from each other. Sign of less-than-stellar writing."
"The Fault in our Stars wasn't written in present tense."
I nodded. "I was really hesitant when I flipped to the middle - like I do, to see if I like the style regardless of the hook of the opening line - and it was first person."
"What is it about first person that annoys you so?"
"Usually the person has no personality. I get it - the author wants her young readers to project themselves onto the tabula rasa of the protagonist. Not my thing." I sipped some more tea, winced when it scalded the roof of my mouth. "But I liked the dialogue, so I flipped back to the beginning and, well, the narrator was a person. Had a personality. I cared about her as well as the people she cared about. The voice was alive. If I ran into that girl on the street, I'd know her as soon as she opened her mouth. That's how I like first person writing. And I don't feel like I see it enough. Not to mention, my preferred young adult authors tend to stick to third person limited."
"Did it ever occur to you that you hate first person because you hate writing about yourself?"
"Yes, and I'm working on that."
"Fault in Our Stars. Would you read it again?"
"I would."
