posted
Hi. On all the pieces I've written so far & on my WIP novel, I've stuck more or less rigidly to using very few viewpoints. It's rare that I'll use more than one. I've probably gone down this route from reading all the advice and technique stuff that's around & from OSC's very own How to Write SciFi/Fantasy.
I like this style & understand the reasoning behind it perfectly well.
However, just recently I've read a couple of newish releases (Dan Brown's deception point being one of them), where there are a good many different POV's. Each one has its own chapter, so its still limited perspective, but there are a significant number of different viewpoints, even from some minor characters from time to time.
Now that I seem to think about this stuff more than I used to, I've found that the use of different viewpoints does come across as quite stimulating. I reckon it's almost like cinematic in style, you get to follow the action from different camera action, which in my opinion does liven things up a bit.
Is this a new style that may be developing / becomming more popular? Has anybody on here written anything in that style?
posted
I've read books with multiple POV and it is always distracting as you figure out who is doing the thinking. However, limiting these to about tow or three seems to be about the limit for me as a reader.
I'm working on a novel with two POV characters. I need to do that because I have events happening in two locations.
posted
I have many POV characters in my WIP. I preface each section with the name of the POV character, so it's obvious. I first saw this done in Startide Rising (David Brin).
I like it. I don't know if others do. But I had a story I wanted to see from multiple perspectives.
posted
George R.R. Martin's Fire & Ice series is good to read for this. His craftsmanship is generally exceptional, and especially so for the use of multiple POV.
Posts: 683 | Registered: Oct 2004
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posted
The key thing with multiple POVs is that you should make it worth the extra effort the reader has to put out. If you're not accomplishing anything that will enhance the reading experience, then don't bother with them. Don't use multiple POVs just to get yourself out of a jam, like to avoid giving away critical information (that's cheating anyway).
Generally, you can tell a more intricate story if you use multiple POVs. You can also show your main characters (and their actions) through the eyes of various other characters. And that can make it worth the extra effort (for both you and your readers). Don't mistake that for a matter of style.
You should also be cautious about telling a lot of different stories that are only occasionally connected. That's one of the big dangers of having multiple POV characters, since everyone is the hero/heroine of his/her own story.
Multiple POV has been quite popular for a long time now, though, like all narrative forms, it has been developing. I know that a few writers here have written in multiple POV.
posted
Something to consider about using multiple POVs:
If the reader cares about one character in particular and not so much about the others, the reader will be frustrated when the author leaves the POV of the character the reader is interested in to move to a different POV. This can be especially frustrating if the author does this with cliff-hangers. The reader may then skip the parts about the less interesting characters and only read them later--so the story will not be read in the order the author intended.
posted
Good point, Kathleen. In fact, that is why I stopped reading Martin's book. There was one or two viewpoint characters who didn't die that I cared about and something like twenty that I couldn't care less about.
Using many viewpoint characters isn't new as near as I can tell. Sometimes it's justified, other times not. I, forone, use the perfect number of viewpoint characters for the story. :-)
Here are some things to keep in mind when considering/using multiple viewpoints:
1. What's first is strongest. The first viewpoint character that a person comes into contact with will automatically get the honor of being the "main" character until and unless you can do something to change our minds later. He ought to, therefore, at least be damn important.
2. We care about what we take the time to know. This means that if you do a rapid-fire succession of viewpoint character up front, each receiving a few pages of "introduction," we won't care about any one of them. (I mention this because I've seen this technique before and it drives me nuts!) It tends to be best to start with someone important at a time when the story is getting started and give us a chance to know and like them.
3. It's easier to get to know that which is vaguely familiar. Therefore, before you switch to a new viewpoint, if you can, mention them in the old viewpoint. If we know who Chuck is, it won't be nearly so miserable to be in his head.
4. If you do multiple viewpoints, something substantial must be accomplished in each viewpoint. Don't do it just for the heck of it. Some stories can be told very well through one character's eyes. My current WIP is told 90% from one character's eyes, with a few very short chapters told from the poitn of view of an antagonist she doesn't know is there. He's looking for her, but she doesn't know it. So if I didn't use his viewpoint, no one would know and when he came in at the end it would be like, "Where the heck did that come from?"
5. Each viewpoint character should be likable or interesting in some way. If we are bored or hate a character, we will not want to read the chapter from his/her point of view. The villain can be a viewpoint character and make for some dramatic irony, but he or she needs to be interesting and three-dimensional. A sidekick does not often make for a good viewpoint character since there is typically nothing he sees that the hero doesn't also see. A complex story, in which many peopl ehave their own agendas, can make for many interesting viewpoints, but the word of caution here is that people will be more interested in one that in another and they may lose patience with you as they wait for their favorite subplot to come back into view.
6. The more viewpoints you have, the more we have to care about each one. This is exponential. You want twenty viewpoint characters? There had better be something interesting, integral, and likeable about each and every one.
7. Don't forget that some stories only need one point of view to be told. Have a reason to branch out and make it a good one.
posted
I agree with what has been said above. Using multiple POV characters is fine, as long as you can get the reader to care about the others and not confuse the heck out of him. Sometimes this is easy, sometimes it's not. Like most writing techniques, you have to know when to use it and when to leave it out.
You should also ask yourself if the second viewpoint is really necessary. Sometimes authors use multiple POVs as a way of including unnecessary or unconnected subplots that have little to do with the main story. While not always a bad thing, this is very difficult to do because you have to make your readers care as much about the subplot as the main one or else they might lose interest completely.
One particularly bad example I can think of in this category is OSC's Pastwatch. He tells the story from the point of view of a certain character whose plot somewhat involves the history of Christopher Columbus. Then he has whole chapters told from the point of view of Columbus, which (as least this was the reaction I had to it) just serve to distract from what we really care about, which is how the main characters are going to save the world. I really have no idea what goes on in these chapters, because I skipped most of them, just like KDW was saying above.
In my WIP, I tell the entire story from the third person limited of one character until the last three chapters. In the third to last chapter, the hero learns that most of his associates (except for one best friend) have been deceiving him for the entire book, but decides to go attempt to save their lives anyway because they really do need his help. So he goes off to face the antagonist alone, and all the other characters stay behind. At this point, instead of following his off, we switch to the POV of the minor character (who's been around since the beginning of the story) and watch as he decides he'd rather die with his friend than stand around and do nothing while the hero gets himself killed. So then he leaves, and we move to the POV of a bystander so we can see how the others react to this (and eventually decide to go off and join the hero themselves). I think in this case the switches are going to work (I haven't actually written it yet), partly I'm not moving from one plot to another, and also because the new POV characters are people the reader has already met long ago and (hopefully) cares about by now.
posted
My WIP has two converging story lines. One is alien, the other is human. They must be told separately because the occur 1/6 of a lightyear apart. Once they converge, I'll need to decide whether I keep one or both POV. Interesting question, there are advantages to both approaches.
Posts: 2 | Registered: Aug 2010
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posted
My WIP has several POVs, although I try to relegate one per chapter. I have outlined the book on a spreadsheet and taken a good look at how the POVs work. Mostly there will end up being three primary POV characters, and I'm trying to make sure each of them has a clear voice in the story. Weaving them together is something like making a braid. I'm trying to make sure the POVs don't clump and become unbalanced. It's an interesting lesson, and one I'm striving to get better with.
Posts: 2026 | Registered: Mar 2005
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posted
I've read several books with mutiple POVs wich were constantly changing and confusing the story. I hated it. One book was completely ridiculous the way the author told the story. I felt like I was reading six separate books under the same title! None of the characters connected to each other in any way, and the POVs were shifting so much that I couldn't bring myself to care about any of them.
On the other hand, I just finished reading a book not too long ago that had, I believe it was three or four POVs. It was done excellently. I cared about the characters equally, and I was never tempted to skip to the next person's point of view.
I think it all depends on if it's done right. You can't have too many characters jumbled into one story, otherwise the reader is lost trying to remember who is who.