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Switching POVs "only" for a few chapters.

Antipode91

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This is an awfully simple questions, but hard to research, as any googling of "multiple POVs" always turns up with articles about how to do, or how you need to introduce them quickly. Not this particular question.

Basically, the book is in first person, with my main peep. However, I want to switch to a love interest POV, but only for like 3-4 chapters. First two to interest him and his different perspective on life compared to the MC, and then another time about halfway through during a pivotal moment. If this turned into a series, I'd do it again for the further books, but again, only a couple of times. Like 90% MC POV.

The question: Is it absolutely needed?
No; these are fake stories. Nothing is "absolutely" needed, and could be moved around to get ride of it.

But I find it interesting, the different perspective, and the romantic element in the middle during a specific scene. Which is why I'm asking. Usually in books, I either see it where the POV is typically even in distribution, or there's so many POVs that it's constantly switching. Haven't come across one where they use the switch very sparingly.

Thoughts?
 

jmurray2112

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Basically, the book is in first person, with my main peep. However, I want to switch to a love interest POV, but only for like 3-4 chapters. First two to interest him and his different perspective on life compared to the MC, and then another time about halfway through during a pivotal moment. If this turned into a series, I'd do it again for the further books, but again, only a couple of times. Like 90% MC POV.

I did this in my novel, but only for a handful of chapters. It wasn't premeditated or anything, it just sort of decided for itself. In the end, I found I really enjoyed switching perspective, and I think it worked well, at least for me.
 

starrystorm

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I switched between 2 points of view, my main lead getting about 75% and the other getting 25%. I haven't seen anything as extreme as 90%, but I think it could be done if done well.


I should have mentioned mine is in first person.
 
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Larry M

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Have you read Ken Kesey's Sometimes a Great Notion? He switched POVs frequently; so much so that it was often difficult to tell which character was speaking.
 

frimble3

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Which made this novel a difficult read for me, at best.

caw
Yes, if the OP is only switching for a chapter here and there, and thus the reader doesn't have a pattern to expect - please, PLEASE identify the alternate POV chapters in some way!
 

Maryn

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Not a fan, except in epic works.

IMO, way too many writers don't see how to convey what the reader wants or needs to know about events that happen "off-screen," when the POV character is not present to witness or participate. Or the writer feels it necessary to share the POV of another character impacted by events--the criminal in a thriller, the love interest in a romance, like that. Yet when I read novels that do either, not only doesn't the POV switch add to the reading experience or story, but often it detracts from it by being a large distraction.

Just one person's opinion.

Consider your basic police procedural, cozy mystery, or private eye novel. There's lots that happens when the POV character isn't theret, right? Yet the authors somehow manage to tell us readers what we missed. And consider that the assumptions I'm likely to make about the criminal or love interest and their character, motives, feelings, and such are probably right and don't merit spelling out.

So I advise against a POV switch unless it serves the plot or illuminates character in a way no other method can.

Maryn, who had to break down some Spenser novels to see how it's done
 

Harlequin

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I feel like that's a truism, though. That we should never do anything in writing, really, unless it serves the book.

Except... I always *could* use a single pov, if I really tried hard enough. In the same way that I always *could* write everything in first person, or in third person, or in a different tense, or with different names, or will less plot points, or more. The book you are writing, could always be a different book.

I don't think there is EVER going to be a situation where you couldn't, theoretically speaking, rework a novel to fit a certain mould. It might change the tenor of the story, but that's sort of the point, surely. Making those decisions alters the presentation. Strictly speaking, don't almost all choices come down to preference and not necessity?
 
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ap123

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Wouldn't bother me at all in 3rd person, but in 1st, it might. First is such an intimate experience, that to switch to someone else's 1st person POV in the middle, for only a few scenes, I imagine it would feel jarring.

Obviously, that's not to say it couldn't be done in a way that it would be smooth, but I'd put serious thought into how/why of doing this.
 

MaeZe

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I'm doing this and there is a reason. One of my characters serves as a bridge between two books. But also I'm writing first person and there were scenes the MC wasn't in.

The Young Elites does this switching to 3rd for the other POVs, each with a chapter switch. So chapter one would be first person, main character. Later, chapter X would be third with character B. Chapter Y would be third with character C and so on. I'd guess it was 70-30% split. A change in POV always occurred with a new chapter.

In mine I've written both characters in first. The split is probably 90-10% and as I wrote the second character's POV I found it difficult to establish his unique voice. I'm still working on editing those chapters to strengthen them. I may have to bring his POV in sooner, I'm not sure yet. Otherwise I need something very distinct so it's clear to the reader besides from the chapter title that this is a different character.
 

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In one (unfortunately unfinished book), I changed POV from the main character to peripheral characters for a chapter. I was surprised how much that helped me tell the story.
 

Laer Carroll

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Usually I dislike switching viewpoints away from the main character. I invest quickly in them, and want to read about them not someone else. But this is a personal preference, not some RULE sent down from on high.

In my latest book I do switch viewpoints. However these scenes are SHORT. And they are about the main character. They give a sort of binocular look at her provided by those secondary characters.

"What do you think of the new kid?"
"I like her. But I wouldn't want to get in a fight with her. Small but mean as Hell if you get on the wrong side of her."
"Really? I thought she was kind of a softie."
"She is. To her friends. But don't threaten any of her friends. Instant Jekyll/Hyde. I saw it when she was embedded with us in Venezuela. We were pinned down...."

LATIME SUNDAY ENTERTAINMENT SECTION. Last night marked the return of composer/conductor Jane Kuznetsov to the podium on summer vacation from the US Air Force Academy. At her high school she reprised her composition "Requiem for a Fawn" with a new interpretation which left some of her fans weeping. It began with a new prelude....
 

Antipode91

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Thanks for everyone's feedback!

I think I'm going to rework the idea behind the scenes so the book remains in a single POV. Someone mentioning that it feels more intimate and personal when it remains as one kind of helped remind me one of the reasons behind why I liked YA, and would be better if I kept it like that, too.
 

Pampurrs

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My last two books were in first person POV, which has it's advantages, but at the same time creates a dilemma... namely, how to inform the reader of events that occurred outside of the POV characters world. I pondered the idea of POV switching, but after reading some excerpts of other works that tried this, I elected not to.
The solution to this dilemma is to bring those events to the attention of the POV character (and simultaneously to the reader) through dialogue, news articles, and discovery. Not as comprehensive or gripping as seeing the events unfold live (through the eyes of a secondary POV), but it does the trick in a smooth fashion.

Your mileage may vary...

Pam
 

Will Rogers

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Thanks for everyone's feedback!

I think I'm going to rework the idea behind the scenes so the book remains in a single POV. Someone mentioning that it feels more intimate and personal when it remains as one kind of helped remind me one of the reasons behind why I liked YA, and would be better if I kept it like that, too.

While reading this, I started thinking of the way this is done in The Martian. Most of the book is told through first-person diary entries by the MC, Mark Watney, but there are certain things he can't tell us in his first person diary. He's stranded on Mars and therefore can't know what's happening on Earth, but the reader needs to know. Likewise, if something happens that endangers Mark's life and requires a quick solution, there's a limit to how much we'd realistically hear about this in a diary entry; Mark would write about the incident after resolving it, so we'd already know that he survives. To get around this, Andy Weir writes all of Mark's chapters in first-person present, then includes chapters from other perspectives in third-person past. I thought it worked well, and I never got confused about what POV I was in while reading.
 

Denevius

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Many years ago (how old this statement makes me sound) I was told that the PoV should never switch unless it’s an omnipresent narrative.

I don’t think it’s so important anymore, and honestly, I switch PoV’s often in my writing. So yeah, I’m bias. But when I read it done in other books, I don’t have much of a problem with it as long as the different characters are all engaging and interesting to read.

Classics like “Catch 22”, “Confederacy of Dunces”, and “The Heart is a Lonely Hunter”, switch PoVs quite a lot. They all worked, and are quite famous novels.

I think the concern is that switching PoVs can be confusing, but I think any confusion is more spawned from doing it badly than doing it at all. I will say, though, after reading another comment here, that I can’t imagine a 1st person narrative having several 3rd person chapters of different characters being easy to pull off. That actually sounds kind of discordant.

It could work, but I would seriously question that strategy.

But yeah, I could write a story in one PoV. But I’ve become attracted to the idea of exploring different character motivations as they relate to the same plot, and that’s hard to get across without telling. I recently read Jack Ketchum’s book, “The Girl Next Door”, which was as compelling as it was tragic, and which was only in one PoV.

Yet at the end of that novel, you simply had to accept the fact that the central antagonist had a genuine reason for doing what she did. You never really learn the motivations for her actions except for tidbits of information that can’t quite explain the level of cruelty she enacted in the narrative, but in the end, you simply say, “Okay, well I guess that’s just how she was.”
 

Harlequin

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A good example of the first/third thing that I always cite is Girl on a Train (or w/e it's called) which swpas between first person "diary entries" from the dead woman and third person narrative of her husband who is on the run.

The Anchor ms that I used them both for is technically in omniscient first (MC1 can see into MC2's head, and narrates what happens to MC2 when they're separated) but it reads like a pov switch between 1st/3rd for all intents and purposes.

the Iain Banks novels I'm currently reading have blatant, in your face head hopping. Character passes out and POV swaps to another person. They wake up and it's back to him *shrug* =P But that's just Banks innit.
 

talktidy

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You should do what you think is the best thing to serve your story.

However, and I am expressing a personal preference here, if the pov change is only for a couple of chapters, for me that would grate. If there is to be more than one pov, I would prefer to see your story check in with the secondary character, no matter how briefly, otherwise there is the sense that the new pov character is being sprung on the reader from left field, and it is obvious they are only there to resolve a narrative technical issue.
 

MaeZe

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My last two books were in first person POV, which has it's advantages, but at the same time creates a dilemma... namely, how to inform the reader of events that occurred outside of the POV characters world. I pondered the idea of POV switching, but after reading some excerpts of other works that tried this, I elected not to.
The solution to this dilemma is to bring those events to the attention of the POV character (and simultaneously to the reader) through dialogue, news articles, and discovery. Not as comprehensive or gripping as seeing the events unfold live (through the eyes of a secondary POV), but it does the trick in a smooth fashion.

Your mileage may vary...

Pam
It depends on the importance of the events. If the main story only needs to know said event happened, those are great ideas.

In the case of my story, one event in particular is major, it involves an attack and two important characters that didn't like each other becoming friends. There are elements of unlikely heroes crossing cultural boundaries.

Sometimes the reader does need to see the events directly.
 

MaeZe

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While reading this, I started thinking of the way this is done in The Martian. Most of the book is told through first-person diary entries by the MC, Mark Watney, but there are certain things he can't tell us in his first person diary....
Gone Girl uses a diary for one POV and first hand for the other.