POV vs. person…
I thought I knew about point of view (POV), but I learned I didn’t the hard way, from a review of one of my books. I consider myself a man of logic and reason, so I accepted the critique and learned from it. I now watch my use of POV like a hawk.
I was confusing person with POV, among other things. They’re related, but they’re not the same. POV can be omniscient, i.e. the viewpoint of someone who’s not a character in the story “looking down” as it were and telling the reader what’s happening. Some narrative (world building in sci-fi, for example) requires this POV. Omniscient POV isn’t recommended in general, though.
Usually the story is written from some character’s POV. An author shouldn’t change that frequently AKA “head-jumping.” The POV should at least be constant in each section of a chapter. Sometimes it’s constant throughout an entire novel (especially if there’s just one character). I’ve seen authors switching POVs within sections and even within paragraphs. Not recommended either.
My sins weren’t terrible ones, and I learned my lesson. I still have to watch for POV, though. Flubbing POV is one of my writing quirks I have to look for when content editing.
What about person? A character’s POV can be in first (pronoun “I”), second (pronoun “you”), or third person (pronouns “she” or “he” or “it”—for the latter, we have to get fantasy creatures and ETs in the prose sometimes), all singular because it’s just one character (I used “we” in the Chaos Chronicles Trilogy, though, for collective intelligences). The choice of person is therefore distinct from POV. For stretches of prose written in first person, they have to be in that person’s POV, of course, which might add to the confusion. But POV can jump around various characters in a book. All those different POVs can be in third person, for example.
Choosing POV and person are selections writers make in their storytelling. They shouldn’t be taken lightly or ignored. When I wrote The Last Humans, I first had the plot idea and choice of main character; other characters came along as I wrote. But I chose person and POV early on. The key is in the subtitle: The Adventures of Penny Castro. (Somehow that got lost in publication. Probably my bad.) I chose Penny’s POV, writing in first person. That worked best in the first parts of the book where it’s mostly Penny against the post-apocalyptic world. I stuck with it in later parts too, even when other characters (i.e. survivors) came into her life.
In the sequel (I’m still thinking about the title), Penny will share the POV with other characters. She’ll be in first person still, but, because many events don’t involve her, the characters involved in those events will be third person. I’ve used this mix before—most notably in my detective series—but I wasn’t the first author to do so (and probably not the last) because I first saw it in James Patterson’s Alex Cross books.
Handling POV and person are two skills a writer must have. For some, it comes naturally; and for some, who think it comes naturally, they make some gaffes. I was one of the latter long ago and pay special attention to it now. It ranks with a getaway car turning from red to blue in mid-chase for its potential in confusing readers.
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Comments are always welcome.
Mind Games. You know A. B. Carolan as the writer of The Secret Lab and The Secret of the Urns. Those novels are sci-fi mysteries for young adults (and adults who are young at heart). In Mind Games, A. B. tells a new story that’s set a bit farther into the future than his first two books. Della Dos Toros is a young girl with psi powers living in the Dark Domes of the planet Sanctuary. Her adopted father doesn’t let her use those powers, but she must do so to find his killer. This story about ESP and androids adds another action-packed novel to the ABC Sci-Fi Mystery series. Coming soon in both print and ebook versions. An excerpt will appear in tomorrow’s newsletter. (Note: A. B.’s first two books are on sale now, but only for email newsletter subscribers.)
Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!
