Narrative Techniques

Narrative techniques are really important when writing a novel, this is because with the use of them we can explain the past of a character, his ideas, memories and alot more! The most commons ones are:


Point of view: The point of view, is related with the person that tells the story, it can be in first, second or third person.

Narration: It answers the question "who is he talking to?". It may be a direct (directly to the reader), Frame (Narrator talks about someone else) and Indirect (Not referring to the reader).

Speech: it answers to the question "how do the narrator and/or characters of a story speak?", It may be direct (Dialogue),  Reported (Narrator summarizes or paraphrases what happened) or Free Indirect (Character's thoughts).

Tense: It may be past (narrator can choose to focus on important events, because it already happened), present (narrator is just as surprised as the reader) or future (the story is  something that will happen).