First person or third person, there is no "wrong" point of view for your story (provided, of course, you've made every effort to find the best point of view). There are pros and cons to each, though, and some things that should be taken into consideration if you do want to tackle that first person narrator.
The first is to remember that you don't have the same freedom with first person as you do third. Because you are speaking as I, me, we, our, etc., you are limited by what your narrator witnesses and experiences firsthand.
This also means there's a key feature you don't have access to as a writer:
The narrator's face.
Sure, you can describe what's happening if they're looking in a mirror, but we often consider that cheating.
Think about it:
She lined her plump, pink lips with a red pencil, brushed a few flecks of mascara off the high cheekbones she inherited from her grandmother.
And perhaps that's not awful. If you're going to use a mirror to describe a character, at least pick unusual features to discuss. That said, you can do better than giving us a basic blonde hair/blue-eyed summary of the girl we'll have to follow for the next two hundred pages just because she happens to be brushing her teeth.
But I digress.
Back to the face. In first person.
An expression of sadness crossed my face.
How do you know? You can't see your face. You can tell us you frowned, but describing a specific expression--something you would see on another character's face if you were standing in front of him or her--doesn't work in first person writing.
What about blushing?
My cheeks grew red with embarrassment.
Again, how do you know they're red? The first person narrator, when thrust in an awkward situation, doesn't know what color his cheeks are, so a different way is needed to convey this. He can feel the heat in his cheeks or the warmth creeping up his neck and into his cheeks, but he Can't. See. The Actual Color.
Another thing to watch out for with the first person narrator: the phrase "to myself."
I said to myself.
I thought to myself.
There are more deft ways to characterize thinking or speaking to oneself, and this kind of phrasing is redundant. "I said" works perfectly fine. If you need to clarify that no one else can hear, then the character can "mutter" or "whisper." He can be speaking "so low she couldn't hear me" or "under my breath." And thoughts are just thoughts . . . which brings me to my next point:
Avoid announcements.
My thoughts drifted.
I remembered.
A writer doesn't have to tell the reader the narrator is thinking. We're smart enough to discern action from dialogue and something that's currently happening in the narrative versus something that happened in the past, so go ahead and present the memory without labeling it.
I know not every reader feels the same way, but I love a first person narrator done well. There are some pitfalls, but these can easily be avoided with additional attention to detail.
Be Brilliant!
~Katie~
