First person works fine as a fictional autobiography. "Reader, I married him". But a less private work demands a wider, impersonal perspective - "I" just wouldn't work for the sort of stuff Dickens or Balzac gave us.

Not the only options though: plenty of "documentary" novels with no narrator - just using letters, press cuttings, police reports etc.

The ones that really piss me off though are the ones done in the SECOND person. I only have to read "And then you think ...." and I say firmly "NO, I BLOODY DON'T" and shut the book. For ever.