Welcome to another blog hop. I’m away at the caravan at the moment, and so might have to check other blogs out on Thursday after I’ve returned home if the internet is patchy. Anyway, here’s this week’s topic:
Do you have advice for changing perspective? For example, switching from writing exclusively in the third person and switching to first person? Or do you have a reason for staying with the perspective you do?
In my novel A House Without Windows I wrote the first half of the book in the first person, as several characters tell the story as it happens. Mid-way through I switched to the third person to write from the point of view of an observer who carries the story forward regarding the aftermath of what had already happened. By writing this way it is easier to distinguish between past and present.
I’ve only ever used both perspectives in the aforementioned book, A House Without Windows. Usually I would write an entire novel either in the first person or in the third person. Literary agents have commented in the past that they prefer the third person, but to show something happening in the here and now in my opinion it is preferable to use the first person. Also with first person, I think a reader can feel more involved in the story and less of an observer.
If you would like to check out my use of perspectives, A House Without Windows is currently just $0.99/£0.99 for the whole of March. The last two book titles underlined above have links to Amazon UK and Amazon US.
Please click on the blue button below for advice from other blog-hoppers regarding switching perspective.
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Stevie Turner 
Hi Stevie, I enjoyed A House without Windows very much. I agree with your comments about writing in the first person and think literary agents are in a time warp, because young people prefer this style too (in my experience). Traditional publishing is not keeping pace with change.
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You may be right, Robbie.
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Reblogged this on aurorawatcherak.
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Thanks Lela.
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I think I like that idea. As a rule, I can’t stick to just one character’s POV. Most stories, whether written in 3rd person or 1st person, are written from multiple characters’ POV. I’ve never swapped between 1st and 3rd within a book, but if you had a good reason — maybe.
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Interesting! I’ve never mixed types of point of view within a single piece, but I can see where that would be useful! @samanthabwriter from
Balancing Act
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Yes, sometimes it can be useful if you’re writing about the past and present together.
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I try to avoid mixing the pov up in the same story. Sometimes it’s not possible, like the one where the narrator died halfway through.
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I’ve done the same sort of POV thing. I have also heard some agents don’t like 1st person. Strange. It gives such a different view of the story.
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Yes, I’ve been told by an agent to write in the third person.
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I’ve heard it’s readers that don’t like first person, but have never seen any proof of that
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Maybe it’s just agents who don’t like it?
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You failed to mention your shifting FP POV in Partners in Time, a real pot modernist take.
Third Person can be as intimate as first as long as there is a focus character and we skip the Omni narrator tendency to get in everyone’s head in a single scene. Or avoid solid head stuff like thought and felt that take us out of it and using the active -ing. “Sure, I’ll go the store for you, Jim” Bob, thinking Hell Yeah get me away from this psycho. Motion language creates motion, as if whatever is happen -ing. First person is good for seeing it through a character’s eyes, but careful manipulation of third is equally, if not more effective in an ensemble scene as long as we stay out of everybody’s head. In the real world we can only operate on what we see and hear. Why should fiction be any different? Except for terror from first person. But I leave that to the psychological thriller people.
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Oh yeah… I forgot. I’m at my holiday home at the moment, and writing has gone out the window.
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I empathize. Or is it sympathize? Anyway, read my post about writing out the window when you get home. It’s gotta cold on that island right now.
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Not too bad. No snow. Spent 3 hours jet-washing the caravan yesterday in weak sunshine.
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That’s work. But it’s that time of year. My back yard is a disaster zone, my patio is filthy and my pressure washer is calling my name. I keep saying “wait till it’s in the 80s” but they seem to be early this year🤣
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I tend to write in the third person but don’t mind reading stories in either. I’m reading a book right now which is in both, which I don’t usually like, but it is done well and works in this case. Like your book, it alternates between the past and the present.
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Shared on Twitter, Stevie. I hope you are having better weather than we have in Beetley. (Rain and cold)
Best wishes, Pete.
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Just landed. Cloudy and 7 degrees here. Not too bad. Spending the day cleaning/ jet-washing the van.
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