A friend of mine sent me the link to this ESPN story about Len Bias' death. It's a good read with lots of different story lines intertwined.
The writer uses both "I" and "we" to tell the story, and I couldn't decide if I really liked or really hated his use of the first person.
I'd be curious to see what anyone else thinks about it.
There was something I found a bit off with this story -- almost like it was trying too hard to do too much -- but I think it does do one important thing: By taking on the specific Bias story, it reminds us to beware of accepting the tidy narratives that often arise from very complicated situations, and to embrace the fact that there is much more beneath the surface.
ReplyDeleteAs for the first-person ... seems he's using it to make the reader be in his shoes and see the same things he saw and feel the same things he felt at certain times in the story. Could that have been done as/more effectively in another way? Probably, though it's always a big writing challenge to make sure people are emotionally with you on the trip.