McAnally's (The Community Pub) > Author Craft
Is it possible to write a novel with three different points of view?
meg_evonne:
Liz, definitely not yours. I will refrain from mentioning titles. I can say however that I've been a solid print book buyer since Borders continually sends me 40% off coupons. So often that I hold off buying until they show up in my e-mailbox. Yet, I feel so burned when a book doesn't measure up and I paid good money for it.
I'm oh so close to buying a kindle for authors that are new to me. Cheaper books, more free chapters, and then maybe I won't feel ripped off. I'm going through YAs with incredible speed to see what the market is. I can't tell you the number of times I get 1/3 to a 1/2 way through and then want to toss them away. Instead, I donate them to the library, which I hate since it promotes a book that I really felt fell way short of where it should have been. Let's face it, I EXPECT MORE FROM THE PUBLISHING INDUSTRY when they want me to chug out 20 bucks after discount for a hardcover.
I can't believe I just admitted that I might, just might, get a kindle... *sigh* what is my world coming to...
Ladyeshu:
Be an actor for a day. Take a few scripts (or books from 1st POV) and read them out loud to yourself (or a friend who won't think you're weird). Try using different voices for the characters. Make your voice high or low, grovelly (did I spell that right); speak fast, slow, according to how you think that person might sound.
It will help you get some perspective on how you'd like your own characters to sound. I throw in accents on my own characters in my head.
This Idea doesn't work for everyone but it may be the thing you need to help make each character and chapter special. :)
Lanodantheon:
Before you do anything else, read the textbook example of this idea of multiple 1st Person POVs expertly executed:
As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner.
59 chapters, each one labelled after one of the book's 15 Narrators.
15!
1 Narrator has Clairvoyance, since he can tell what other people are thinking and can see events in other places as they are happening
and 1 Narrator is dead....
It's also hilarious(if you can keep up with the language.) It has some of the funniest, most pitch-black humor involving a family from the Deep South I've ever read and it's not a shallow book. It goes over all sorts of social and metaphysical topics.
For what you are talking about doing, read this book. If you've already read it, read it again.
the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh:
--- Quote from: Lanodantheon on March 27, 2011, 03:32:25 AM ---Before you do anything else, read the textbook example of this idea of multiple 1st Person POVs expertly executed:
As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner.
59 chapters, each one labelled after one of the book's 15 Narrators.
15!
--- End quote ---
Anyone else read Geoff Ryman's 253 ?
253 characters. 253 words each. All on a London Underground train. The action of the novel covers two and a half minutes. There is no way in hell it should work as having plot tension and revelation and pacing and so on like a more normal novel, but it does anyway. Astounding piece of work.
(It can be read online, but it's full of thematic hyperlinks and so forth, which while neat, kind of undercut the impact of the amazing stuff it is doing if you read it in order.)
meg_evonne:
http://storiesonstage.org/larrypaulsen.aspx
Larry is a friend and I sadly missed his performance of 39 Steps, which is four actors playing tons of parts, at the Denver Center Theatre Company last fall. I can only hope we get another chance to see it, as it was a blockbuster and made money in a down economy. I ditto above. Books, shows like these help get your mind around voice that will help keep the three points of view distinct.
How is it coming, btw?
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