Question about multiple POVs in YA

Rufus Coppertop · Mar 8, 2010

Are there many YA novels out there that have subplots from other POV's?

The thing I'm working on now needs to tell things from the bad guy's POV sometimes. I'm just wondering if that would be the KOD to publishability.

Miss T · Mar 8, 2010

It's a little distracting to have a new POV that doesn't even relate to the main plot, but I don't believe it's uncommon at all to show the villain's half. Everybody loves a little dramatic irony now and then!

Rufus Coppertop · Mar 8, 2010

Miss T said:
It's a little distracting to have a new POV that doesn't even relate to the main plot, but I don't believe it's uncommon at all to show the villain's half. Everybody loves a little dramatic irony now and then!

Thanks for that.

Maybe I misused the term "subplot". Everything will relate to the main plot but there will be forays into other characters' POV's.

Miss T · Mar 8, 2010

Ah, alright. As long as it's clear, I don't see the problem, and I know that I've seen it before.

shaldna · Mar 9, 2010

In my novels all the subplots take place through someone elses POV.

My minor characters, although central to the main story, have thier own dramas, so I tell it from their POV.

Sage · Mar 9, 2010

You're definitely misuing "subplots." A subplot is just what it says it is--a secondary plot that is not as important to the story as the first.

There are certainly YA novels that have multiple POVs, sometimes even from the villain's POV. One example I can think of off the top of my head is Melissa Marr's Wicked Lovely series.

Barbara R. · Mar 9, 2010

Rufus Coppertop said:
Are there many YA novels out there that have subplots from other POV's?

The thing I'm working on now needs to tell things from the bad guy's POV sometimes. I'm just wondering if that would be the KOD to publishability.

I don't think a YA novel is much different from an adult novel. Using a second POV shouldn't be a problem, as long as you let readers know early on that you'll be changing POV occasionally. If you do it only once or twice fairly late in the book, it would be disorienting.

ceenindee · Mar 9, 2010

I see multiple POVs in YA all the time. More often than not, even, recently. Unwind, The Bartimaeus Trilogy, Midnighters and The Last Days, Breaking Dawn, Shiver (which I'm thoroughly enjoying; thanks to those of you who recommended it), Dangerous Girls, My Sister's Keeper, and Artemis Fowl are just a few that I can think of off the top of my head, all either first-person or third-person limited. I can see why it's popular--you get all the knowledge of an omniscient narrator and all the intimacy of a limited narrator. I have a villain-hero first-person multiple POV going on myself. I'm sure you can pull it off.

Rufus Coppertop · Mar 10, 2010

Thanks guys! I'll keep doing what I'm doing then.

Question about multiple POVs in YA

Rufus Coppertop

Miss T

Rufus Coppertop

Miss T

shaldna

The cake is a lie. But still cake.

Sage

Our Lady of Parentheticals

Barbara R.

Old Hand in the Biz

ceenindee

Rufus Coppertop