I hate it when you’re reading a short story and you realize halfway through that the first person narrator is the opposite gender as what you’ve been imagining. It really throws you out of the story. This happened to me just now.
I always assume that a first person narrator is the same gender as the author unless there’s a very clear signal early on to the contrary. For example, if the author is female but is writing a male first person narrator, she might start out the story like this:
My friend Bob tapped me on the shoulder and said, “Hey Mark. Nice penis you’ve got there.”
“Thanks,” I said. “So what’s up?”
Okay, actually that might be overdoing it a bit. But seriously, clue us in somehow.
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