# Changing point of view



## snotterdott (Feb 1, 2013)

So, i am currently writing a book, and i want to change the point of view (kinda like in the "game of thrones" series)

But i cant change the point of view in every chapter. like George RR Martin does. So would it be weird to "randomly" change point of view to a normal solder? (or another main character)


Thanks for any help! =)


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## BWFoster78 (Feb 1, 2013)

snotterdott said:


> So, i am currently writing a book, and i want to change the point of view (kinda like in the "game of thrones" series)
> 
> But i cant change the point of view in every chapter. like George RR Martin does. So would it be weird to "randomly" change point of view to a normal solder? (or another main character)
> 
> ...



I, for one, hate the way GRRM does it.  I think that the way he changes focus every chapter disrupts from the reader getting into the flow of the story.

The way you're describing, "randomly," is done a lot.

I would suggest, however, that you focus on a single protagonist and have the person's POV be dominant.  Make it his story.  Then, sprinkle in other POVs as necessary.


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## T.Allen.Smith (Feb 1, 2013)

I love GRRM's work, as well as the way each chapter offers a different POV. You won't please everyone with the writing choice you make here, so do what you feel is right for the story.

What we're discussing here is stylistic choice. Some readers & writers prefer more continuity with their POVs while others don't mind jumping around. I do think that jumping POVs requires stronger characters as the reader needs to reinvest in some characters every chapter and also find some characters interesting enough to not skip ahead to those POVs they love.

I'm not sure what you mean by "randomly" but I assume you're talking about switching POVs mid-chapter... If that's what you mean then yes....it's fine. It's done often.

As long as its written well, you camp jump POVs in any way you choose. Don't, however, fall into the trap of thinking you have to please everyone with your stylistic choices. It's impossible and, in the end, that futile effort will leave your work watery and thin. Do what's right for your story.


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## snotterdott (Feb 1, 2013)

Just forget the silly message that was here...... =)


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## T.Allen.Smith (Feb 1, 2013)

Sorry. I'm not understanding what you mean.


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## Butterfly (Feb 1, 2013)

I'd say you can make the shift, but you will need to learn how set it up. Random changes are not good... they can result in the reader losing the focus of the story.

There are tools to shifting POV... a blank line between the two just as you would use at a time jump, or change in location. The blank line breaks off from the previous section making it clear that there is some sort of shift. One POV per chapters, as you've already stated. It can be done in the flow of text, you will have to practice how to... Self-Editing for Fiction Writers has a few good examples of how to do this.

If you are going to do it, it needs to be done with a suitable character, rather than someone who just pops in now and then. I mean to a character that is well rounded and not just there to pass on information.


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## Helen (Feb 1, 2013)

snotterdott said:


> So, i am currently writing a book, and i want to change the point of view (kinda like in the "game of thrones" series)
> 
> But i cant change the point of view in every chapter. like George RR Martin does. So would it be weird to "randomly" change point of view to a normal solder? (or another main character)
> 
> ...



Here's my rule-of-thumb:

It's OK to change point of view if that's the best way to show the arc.

Hope that makes sense.


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## Wanara009 (Feb 1, 2013)

Treat POV like a contagious disease

You should only switch POV amongst characters with an established link with 'patient zero' aka 'the protagonist'. This way, it'll be easier for you to weave the many POVs into the main narrative since the characters are already linked with the main protagonist.

Personally though, I choose two to three characters to the be my POV bearers and stick with it for the rest of the story. I did this because it's easier to keep track of.


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## kayd_mon (Feb 1, 2013)

Will this be for only one section of the story, or will it be something used multiple times? If it's single use, then I think it can work well, and readers shouldn't have any problems. If you switch randomly, like Virginia Woolf would do sometimes, then it's tricky to do well.


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## Feo Takahari (Feb 1, 2013)

I'll second Wanara's advice. I once read a story (the name of which escapes me) that began in the near-future, had a human female protagonist, and was told in third person. A ways into the story, there started appearing first-person chapters from the perspective of a talking animal in a fantasy kingdom. By the time the two characters finally encountered each other, I was completely lost, and I think what confused me was the lack of apparent connection between these POVs.


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## Steerpike (Feb 1, 2013)

I guess I'll disagree with most of what is said here, at least insofar as they appear to be "musts" for POV change. There are all kinds of novels out there, in fantasy and elsewhere, that shift POV within a chapter. Steven Erikson, for example, may change POV 5 or 6 times within a single chapter. And he sometimes changes to people who are entirely new and have no as-yet established link to the other characters. The link between them all may not even come until the end of the book.

Erikson signals a POV shift with an extra space between paragraphs. Virginia Woolf changed POV within a single paragraph, using no artificial mechanism to signal the shift. It worked just fine. Your reader isn't stupid; they don't need a road sign saying "ALERT: POV CHANGE" or even the literary equivalent of it. They just need good writing.

Go with your vision of the story. There are plenty of works where there may be one POV character for five or six chapters, and then it switches to another character for a chapter. There's nothing wrong with that. The real question here can only be asked in retrospect, and it is not "can I do X" but "did I effectively do X." If the answer is yes, then great. If no, then you go fix it.


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## Philip Overby (Feb 2, 2013)

As far as Erikson goes, I think he does his POV changes pretty well.  His writing overall can be disorienting at times, but I think that's what I like about him.  He's not easy to read or figure out, but once you get what he's doing, it's very rewarding reading I think.  His POV changes aren't that disorienting for me.  As Steerpike said, readers aren't stupid.  They can figure out things pretty quickly.

For GRRM, one of his strengths I think is being able to tell stories in multiple POVs without losing my interest.  Some writers can't pull that off as well.  As others have said, it really depends on taste.  I personally like POV shifts in stories, but I've taken to not using them in my own work recently.  Mostly because I think you have to really know how to handle one POV before diving in and trying multiple ones.  Now that I'm learning how to handle one, it's making it more reasonable for me to try multiple ones in the future.

For me, if a POV character just seems superfluous and isn't really adding anything to the overall plot, then it can make me lose interest in a story.  So that's one thing to be aware of.  Make sure your POVs are doing lots of work for the story.  If they're not, then you probably don't need them.


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## Penpilot (Feb 2, 2013)

Yes, you can switch POVs "randomly" BUT, a very big BUT, IMHO it's very hard to do smoothly. If you don't do it well the reader will go all buggy-eyed each time you shift. I just tried reading _The Summer Tree_ by Guy Gavriel Kay. IMHO he didn't do the head jumping thing very well in that book, and I just couldn't get into the rhythm of the story because he kept jumping in mid-chapter. So I put it down.

Think carefully about what your story needs. If you think jumping around is the best way for you to tell the story, I say go for it.


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## Steerpike (Feb 2, 2013)

See, I thought the POV shifts in _The Summer Tree_ were just fine. Which probably underscores another point about being true to your own vision and writing the story in the way that speaks to you, and as you'd want to read it. Because seeking to please all readers from the outset is a losing proposition


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## wordwalker (Feb 2, 2013)

Sounds like there are a *lot* of mixed opinions here. So it's clear many writers can't do the balance right, and many readers won't find it to their taste anyway-- and many others will.

But I will say this: when Virginia Woolf shifted viewpoints between ordinary paragraphs, she was *WRONG* --or at rather, she was pushing her style to a point that most of us simply can't pull off, and don't need to try. (This is also the author who hid in the middle of a big paragraph that fact that her MC had died a couple of months ago. Tricky lady.)

So _please,_ put a break between paragraphs when you change viewpoints. And, not just a skipped line but a line of asterisks; I've seen authors use the "empty line" and bewilder readers when that line got lost at the top or bottom of a page.


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## Steerpike (Feb 2, 2013)

She didn't just shift between ordinary paragraphs, she shifted within the text of a single paragraph.

It's easy to say she was wrong, but she's one of the most well-respected modernist of the time (as I suppose you know, since you seem familiar with her). How was she wrong? Because you didn't like it, or because you think you can't emulate it successfully? I think she did a nice job, personally.


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## wordwalker (Feb 2, 2013)

Sorry if I wasn't clear. I respect her for pulling it off; I think it's wrong for the rest of us to take chances like that when we aren't as good as she is.

(Yes, I know there's the whole "Omniscient Viewpoint" style, but honestly I think it's best for either light stories or heavyweight authors like VW. One viewpoint at a time is so much stronger.)

--Edit: Okay, you don't actually have as good as Woolf to make it work. But it takes a lot of specific effort and practice to do right, and it's just not something to attempt casually. And the OP wasn't about reinventing styles.


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## Steerpike (Feb 2, 2013)

Wordwalker:

I have a couple of views of that. 1) we don't know whether we're good enough to do it unless we try it, so I wouldn't discourage an author ahead of time who announced their intention to write in the style of Woolf; and 2) I doubt Woolf was always good enough to pull it off, but at some point she became good enough. So, then, I would encourage a writer who really wants to write in that style to stick with it and try to become good at it even if their first efforts are less than successful.

There's certainly no reason to force that style, but if that's what speaks to you then I say run with it and see how it goes.

As for the OP, yes I saw no indication the OP wants to write like Woolf, so we've moved to a broader point in a way. But I don't see anything wrong with the approach the OP suggested to POV, because I see that done all the time.


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## HÃ«radÃ¯n (Feb 2, 2013)

My advise would be to stick to your main characters and important secondary characters for your pov, like with my story, I have 3 main characters but events that are important that they are not present for/not yet born for I use a secondary character like their father or mother or some other supporting character. As for actually switching between povs (what I like to do is) continue with your current pov until he either leaves and there are still more things to talk about, just make sure that it still goes with the plot/subplot of the chapter. Many writers will have several povs in one chapter and it works for them, GRRM/Tolkien's work is not necessarily how every writer needs to operate.


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## T.Allen.Smith (Feb 2, 2013)

There's nothing wrong with experimentation. In fact, when choosing how to deliver a story, writing some of it in multiple ways, with differing POVs, switching between them in different ways, can be incredibly helpful as an exercise to whittle down to the most effective method for finding your unique storytelling voice.


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## scottmarlowe (Feb 5, 2013)

Changing POV without any warning is quite jarring. I'm reading a book now where the author does it every once in a while and it's kind of annoying.

I don't have any problem with reading a story told from multiple POV's, as long as the POV characters are done well and not there just to fill some space.


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