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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/q/47299
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

I am writing a short story where the narrator is recording a message to his daughter about some tragic event and in between the narration, the narrator sometimes tries to address directly his daughter.

Basically, the narrator recounts his story in the past tense, since it happened twenty years ago, then he shifts to the present tense when addressing his daughter in the middle of narration as if to give further context on the said events.

For example:

> What I saw on that night would forever haunt my dreams for the rest of my life. I was at a loss on what to make out of what I saw.
> 
> Maribel, there are things in this world that we humans are just not meant to know… things so unworldly, so fundamentally wrong that our minds just couldn’t comprehend it without losing our sanity.

Notice that when the narrator was recounting his nightmarish ordeal, he is talking in the past tense.

But when he shifts his focus to directly address his daughter, Maribel, he does so in the present tense.

Is the shifting of tenses in the middle of narration an acceptable grammar practice? Or not?

Thanks.

Original score: 13