The second person is not a common perspective in fiction and memoir—for good reason. It’s hard to write.
In second-person point of view (POV), the narrator talks directly to the reader by addressing the reader as “you,” but using the second person goes a little further than that.
In the second-person, your reader becomes a character and there must be something for them to do in the book. The character “you” has specific characteristics and reactions and intimately interacts with the story.
Beyond the choose-your-own-adventure books you may have grown up reading, most writers don’t exclusively use second person, though the second person appears in novels and memoirs. When writers use the second person, they tend to use it sparingly and for a specific reason or to make a specific point.
Erin Morgenstern’s fantasy novel, The Night Circus, uses second-person POV in short, recurring sections to create a dreamy quality that draws the reader into the magic of the circus, as in the following passage:
It takes your eyes a few moments to adjust, and then tiny dots of light begin appearing like stars, lining the dark walls in front of you.
And while moments before you were so close to your fellow circusgoers that you could have touched them, now you are alone as you feel your way tentatively forward through a mazelike tunnel.
The tunnel twists and turns, the tiny lights providing the only illumination. You have no way of discerning how far you have gone or which direction you are moving in.
Finally you reach another curtain. Fabric that feels as soft as velvet beneath your hands parts easily when you touch it.
The light on the other side is blinding.
While much of The Night Circus is written in a near-objective third-person POV (we’ll talk through the objective and the third person in coming articles), the interspersed second-person passages, like the one referenced, pull in the reader more fully, make them part of the events unfolding before them, and capture their imagination.
The short, recurring sections mean your reader gets a break from the invasiveness of the second-person POV, which requires the reader to be part of the story.
But second-person POV may also detach the reader slightly to highlight traumas, because it may mirror the sense of shock one feels when dealing with massive, life-changing emotions, as in Tamsyn Muir’s novel, Harrow the Ninth:
It was very cold. A fine shimmer of frost now coated your cheeks, your hair, your eyelashes. In that smothering dark, your breath emerged as wisps of wet grey smoke. Sometimes you screamed a little, which no longer embarrassed you. You understood your body’s reaction to the proximity. Screaming was the least of what might happen.
In the passage above, Harrowhark is the viewpoint character. Her mind is haunted, so she detaches, speaks of herself as “you,” distances her experience from her immediate processing to highlight the trauma, to shine a bright light on it.
Highlighting works well because, while the first- and third-person POVs slip into the background of the narrative, the second person draws attention to itself.
That attention can be difficult to maintain, especially over the length of a book. Even Muir switches to the more immediate and accessible third-person POV within Harrow the Ninth.
Second person may also drive away the reader who cannot or will not identify with the “you” being described, because the second-person POV can come off like a finger point to the chest for the reader.
But it can also be a fun POV to experiment with, especially in short fiction pieces, as a tool for immediacy and immersion of experience.
Here’s a passage from one of my original flash fiction pieces, an homage to Robert W. Chambers’s short story collection, The King in Yellow, titled, Descend:
The black water rises with the moon’s pull. Swallow it down and lap the salty dregs at the bottom as they crunch and crackle between teeth. Drink up all that will soon be until the belly crusts with the damp chill of crackling power dreadful. Pull the cloak tighter with each step until stars hang darkly and the wind howls surreptitious instruction.
Now, this passage isn’t for the reader who’d refuse to descend a dark staircase to a landing unknown—myself included, if I’m being honest.
However, for the Chambers reader who longs to know who is behind the pallid mask, the POV style conceals identity and hides just a bit from the reader, who may delight at the surprise.
And notice the “you” is implied, rather than declared, which gives the reader a break in a story that could otherwise become heavy with “yous.”
Writing & Revising the Second Person Well
Since you’re up for some creativity when writing your book, and you’ve chosen the second-person POV to deliver at least part of your message, you’ll want to know how to write and revise the second person well and keep your book away from your ideal reader’s dastardly did-not-finish pile.
Writing the second person well benefits from a few considerations:
- appropriateness
- originality
- presence
Appropriateness
If you write in the second person as a way of performing a literary flex, you’re doing it wrong, because the second-person POV must be appropriate for the story you tell.
You must have a reason for using the second person, either involving your reader in the story, as in the passage from Descend, or detaching from the viewpoint perspective with purpose, as in the passage from Harrow the Ninth. For the reader to feel that purpose or entertain it, they must become an active participant in the plot and action. In short, the reader must become an active character.
Questions to ask yourself:
- What is my purpose for writing in the second person?
- What will the “you” in my story do to push the story forward?
- What information will the reader need to best understand their role in my story as either participant or observer?
World Building
In Descend, the reader steps into the cold black to discover the face behind the pallid mask. In The Night Circus, the reader is a circusgoer who visits and interacts with the displays and rubs elbows with others equally as enchanted as they are.
When creating a world with fantastic elements, especially when the reader needs to suspend their disbelief to really “get” the story, invite them into your book world using short, recurring sections in the second person.
Questions to ask yourself:
- What key movements will my reader need to make to have the story-world experience I want them to have?
- What does my reader need to see, touch, hear, smell, taste, or sense, to understand and immerse themself in my story world?
- How will the reader’s involvement change the outcome or meaning of the story for them?
Psychological Distance
In Harrow the Ninth, the reader is part of the main character’s consciousness. In Descend, the reader learns they are the face behind the pallid mask.
When using the second person to create psychological distance for a character or avatar, there should be a big enough reason to separate the single being into two distinct forms.
Questions to ask yourself:
- What reason do I or does my character have for splitting their experiences into two distinct personalities?
- What key pieces of information will my reader need to understand this splitting and the rationale behind it?
- How do the two distinct experiences affect my character’s or avatar’s trajectory in the main story?
Originality
Still, without originality, the second person becomes boring. Quickly.
I’m not talking about the originality of the story you write, though that’s a consideration; I’m talking about the originality of the text you write.
If your book is littered with phrases like “you say,” “you notice,” “you smell,” you’re constantly reminding your reader that you’re writing in the second person. Those sensory filters are distracting and mostly end up pulling your reader out of the character in whose body they’re supposed to inhabit.
In Descend, the reader doesn’t explicitly see the rising water, taste the salt, or feel the cloak. Those senses are implied, the boring verbs exchanged for more immersive ones or left out altogether intentionally.
Look at the places in the story where you mention “you,” “your,” and “yours.”
Questions to ask yourself:
- Can I remove the second-person pronoun while keeping the meaning of the sentence or section clear for the reader?
- Will the pronoun removal better immerse the reader in the story experience?
- Can I show, rather than tell, my reader what’s happening by eliminating most sensory filters?
Presence
The second person does best when it provides a sense of immediacy—that something is happening right now in which the reader must become involved.
After all, it’s easier to guide a reader through a spontaneous experience than to impress upon them a memory of something that happened in the past. Both The Night Circus and Descend are in the present tense for this reason.
But there is an exception: The trauma-detachment style used in Harrow the Ninth is written in the past tense, but there’s an immediacy blend in Muir’s writing.
In the passage, Muir uses phrasing like “now” and “what might happen” to suggest to the reader that the actions and experience are in the present.
Questions to ask yourself:
- What is happening in the story that the reader must become involved in?
- What will the reader need to know about their immediate setting or position to understand their role?
- What will the reader need to know about their character’s past to understand their role?
Last Notes on the Second Person
Novels written entirely in the second person can challenge the reader and tire them out if it goes on forever. So, the quiet consideration for using the second person is quantity.
If the book feels long and tiresome—and be honest with yourself when assessing this or ask an early reader for help—consider switching between the second person and either the first or third person in alternating chapters or sections.
Alternating the POV will allow the reader to take a mental break and have a more enjoyable reading experience overall.
And I would be remiss not to mention convention, because using the second person is rather unconventional for fiction and memoir; it sticks out to the reader.
Since the POV sticks out, ensure you hit your key story turning points and other genre-specific conventions (or abandon them with intention, at the very least) so your book itself doesn’t become too finger-pointy and pokey for the reader to handle.
Happy writing!
<3 Fal
P.S. Missed the POV deep dive on the first person? Check it out here.
P.P.S. Check in next week for a deep dive into the third person.
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Fallon Clark is a story development coach and editor with more than a decade of experience in communications, project management, writing, and editing. She provides story development and revision services to independent and hybrid publishers and authors spanning genres and styles. And in 2018, she had the joy of seeing Forever My Girl, one of her earliest book projects, on the big screen. Fallon’s writing has been published in Flash Fiction Magazine and The MicroZine. Find her online at FallonClarkBooks.Substack.com, or connect with her on LinkedIn or Substack.