How Writing 1st Person POV Gave Me Boy Cooties

Yesterday, at #LERANM, my local RWA chapter, I gave a tutorial on using Twitter. We had a great time and the lovely and viviacious Katie Lane snapped this pic as I was talking. And gesticulating. LOL!

This week's topic in the bordello concerns perspective - as in first, second or third person point of view (POV) - which works best for us and why.

I started out writing in first person, because my natural form from the beginning was personal essays. Very much like my blog posts. I sometimes segue into second person, I notice. Particularly in blog posts where I start saying things like you don't really notice how essays and blog posts tend to be in first person because you expect non-fiction to be more so than fiction. <-See what I did there?

So, when I went to write my first novel - which eventually and after many revisions and iterations became Rogue's Pawn - I wrote that in first person. In fact, and I admit this with chagrin, I originally wrote that book in a memoir style. As if I, myself, had fallen through a gate to Faerie and wrote a memoir about my adventures. I thought I was SO BRILLIANT doing that, subverting the genre tropes and all. Thing is, I didn't write genre well enough to subvert the tropes - something I had to learn through painful trial, error and ego-bruising. Thinking about it now, it IS kind of a cool idea. Something I might have the craft to pull off at this point.

Hmm...

Anyhoo. I wrote in first person because it was what I knew and I had some skill at it. Readers tell me they like my first person perspectives when they don't like others. It's not easy to do because it's so restrictive. The reader can only know what the first person POV characters now. You can mix in more than one first person POV character (I don't like it) or mix in a third-person POV in with the first (like that even less), but the purest form - and really my very favorite - is one person, telling the story through their eyes. It works well for me because I feel like I can really delve into the person's character, along with their emotional and spiritual arc.

I started writing third person with erotic romance. Most fiction is really in third person. With my full length erotic romance novels, the Falling Under trilogy, I added in the hero's third-person POV too. I alternate POVs in those and that's fun, too, to build the story from two perspectives like that. I keep a very close POV, so that it's barely a step removed from first person. So close, in fact, that in writing the third book in the trilogy, I inadvertently slipped into first person - writing from the hero's POV! I couldn't figure out why I felt so... odd. Then I realized, a page or two later, that I was inside a man's head. A very strange place to be.

This may have marked a step up in writing craft for me however. I might try it again, if I can make sure to wash off the boy cooties afterward. ;-)

For the fantasy series I'm working on now - brand new, top sekrit stuff! - I'm writing in third person alternating POV, because my agent, fabulous Connor, asked me to. He  and Iwanted to target a particular market and I like the idea of selling books as well as the next Word Whore. At first I struggled, however. I *really* wanted to write in first person, particularly the heroine. But I applied discipline (GASP) and found my way through to her voice. Now I'm into it.

So, that doesn't really answer the question, I know. I like having all the tools. Each story is different and so are the various markets.

It would be interesting to know if you all like how I write one kind of POV over another - feel free to share!

POV: Accepting Constraints

Point of view. It sounds so wonderfully straightforward, doesn't it? Pick a character. Tell the story from their point of view. Simple!

Except.

We then get sentences like "She turned purple with rage." What's wrong with it? It kinda violates POV. The last two words specifically. See, if I am the POV character, I can only tell you what I observe. I observed that she turned purple. 'With rage' is an assumption. IF that assumption is being made because it is within the confines of my character to do so, then okay - writer using a character's jumping to conclusion tic as a device within the story - maybe altering that character trait is part of the arc. Roger that.

It's just that 99% of the time, that's not what's happening. Certainly, it isn't what's happening when *I* do it. No. Most of the time, it's lazy story telling. Shorthand that let's me pretend there's emotion in my scene. Except that using my POV character to tell you someone turned purple with rage is just that - telling you. It's shallow POV. Showing is easier if I go deeper into my POV character's head, which makes it harder for me, as the author, to intrude. Then the same observation would look more like this:

Air hissed in between her clenched teeth. Her face flushed purple and she clenched her fists. I backed up a step.

Not a single feeling word in there - just a report of what a POV character saw, heard, and then how she reacted. From those things, you have a good grip on the underlying emotion. Given dialogue and context, you'd know whether my POV character had just delivered bad news, challenged this other gal to a duel, or what have you. You'll notice I automatically put this in first person. It's easier for me to get deep POV if I draft a story in first person. Most of my stories end up being 3rd person and I make that change in rewrites. Makes for interesting typos but drafting in first reminds me to stay honest about what my character can conceivably see, hear, smell, taste, think or feel.

POV is about accepting the constraints and limitations of only knowing what a single character can know. That's why so many stories trade off POV characters between scenes and/or chapters, so you can get more than one perspective on the central conflict. When I do that, generally sharing story telling between my heroine and hero, I have to decide who should have the story telling reins, when. I ask who among the characters has the most to lose. Sounds simple. Rarely is. It usually means me writing a scene or chapter both ways because I'm pathetic like that. Don't get me wrong. Usually, the POV I write in the first time (THIS character has the most to lose) is correct, but second guessing R I, thus the whole thing gets done from the other POV, too. Just in case *that* one is better. Leading my own observation that Point of View is certainly craft first, but once the mechanics are worked out, it becomes an art in your hands - one that dictates the voice and color of your stories.