Hi Niall, Thanks for your read and response. The more "modern" approach is to stay with the 3rd person (or the first) but shorten the distance between the narrator and the reader. This is sometimes called "close" POV. Practising with 1st person POV is a good way to start. Listening to conversations on public transport can give you an insight into modern dialect. Everything becomes shorter for writers today. (Not al!) Read 21st century authors who you like and go with that. Many readers still love the classics too. Do a comparison.