WRITING: Verb Tense

I would say that I’m fairly competent on grammar and punctuation skill, but aside from the semicolon–a fairly simple set of rules to comprehend that I hope to master and have the fact proudly emblazoned on a rock above my remains some day; it is more of a stubborn mental block rather than a question of understanding–I do admit a problem with verb tense. 

In a piece I’m currently working, the story opens in the past tense.  A man is dead.  The bulk of the piece then goes to the backstory, or the prior week leading up to this, which both naturally and properly would call for the use of the past perfect tense, "used to refer to actions that took place and were completed in the past. The past perfect is often used to emphasis (sp., their’s) that one action, event or condition ended before another past action, event, or condition began."  (Using Verb Tenses, University of Ottowa)

I don’t think you’d find a more clear-cut example of past perfect than the relating of a story of a dead man and his actions prior to his death. 

The problem is, the necessary "had" prior to the verb, even allowing for a few contracted " ‘d"  (he’d, she’d, they’d, etc.) may be inhibiting the flow of the story. Maybe it’s just my own thing after several readings, and I am still finding spots where I’ve settled into the past in a sequence to sound out more natural, less formal.  Here then, I’m mixing tenses improperly.

I like the past perfect tense, I like the italicized dialogue in lieu of quotations I’ve used; but the decision must be made where consistency and readability are at odds.  I believe there was a post somewhere some time ago about the current trend in fiction to forget the whole past perfect dilemma, but I think it’s important, especially in this day and age of anything goes, to adhere to at least some of the rules. 

NOTE:  Excellent site by the way, the University of Ottowa’s "Hypergrammar," and I’ve both bookmarked it and linked it here under Resources.