What’s Your Point of View?

by Lisa Sledge

I finished reading The Tale of Despereaux two days ago. I’d never read it before. Shocking, really, since it’s a Newbery winner, a movie, and written by Kate DiCamillo.

I love Because of Winn Dixie.

In Despereaux, Kate used a strong omniscient voice. I’ve experimented with this for my own WIP. It’s really hard. So I wondered, as I read, what makes an author choose one point of view over another?

There’s a huge trend in YA and children’s books for stories in the first person because it brings the reader closest to the protagonist. Third person is a standard POV in novels.  It puts another degree of distance between the reader and the characters, yet still keeps them close. But what about omniscient?

I watch Brandon Sanderson‘s writing classes on youtube. He said that using an omniscient POV puts the greatest degree of distance between the reader and your characters, that it’s been out of favor for at least 20 years, and basically stamped the words “DO NOT ATTEMPT ” across it. Everything else I’ve heard or read seems to be in agreement.

Why did Kate DiCamillo use the omniscient POV for her story? And don’t tell me it’s because she’s awesome and therefore she can do whatever the heck she wants. That’s true, but she’s also a gifted and inspiring artist. She wouldn’t have done it without a valid reason.

This is my theory. I think the POV can help define your novel’s voice and become part of the entertainment. And I also believe that sometimes you need distance in your story. The Tale of Despereaux is a book for young children, yet terrible things happen. There are death sentences, rats who strip little mouse bones clean, tortured prisoners, child slavery, abuse, a dead queen, and a kidnapping. The distance of the omniscient voice allowed her to present difficult material to a  sensitive audience.

And you know what? I liked it.

I also think it takes serious talent to make omniscient POV work. Which is why Kate’s book won a Newbery and mine is being rewritten.

What is your favorite POV as a writer? Is it different from what you enjoy reading?

Three Things Thursday

One Thing:

I haven’t taken the time to thank all the people who post here and help me in doing so. Cheryl, Brenda, Debbie and Lisa, I  couldn’t keep coming up with idea after idea. So thank you so much for sending me pieces each week.

Love, Carol

Two Things:

There was a 6.0 earthquake in Napa, California on Sunday morning. I’m about 20 miles from the epicenter. 

 

I woke up to the bed shaking like we were in a frying pan. 3:20 am. I jumped out of bed, but the ground wasn’t stable either. 

 

“Earthquake,” I told my husband, whose first thought was that the rattling windows was an intruder. “Earthquake, earthquake!”

 

Then, “The baby!”

 

The few feet to her room seemed to stretch into eternity. The quake was over by the time I got there. She’d slept through it. Her rocking chair rocked as if someone sat in it, watching us. 

 

My next thoughts turned to the potential damage for those at the epicenter. I thought it originated in San Francisco, 60 miles away. If that was true, it meant at least a 9.0 magnitude. The city was demolished. Underwater. Millions were dead. 

 

The news took about 20 minutes to catch up, but Facebook was alive within seconds. I cried when friends from San Francisco posted that there was no significant damage, relieved. 

 

Slowly, facts trickled in. Napa is a small tourist town known for its wineries. Damaged buildings, fires, and mostly minor injuries. But thankfully, nothing like the devastation I’d imagined. 

 

So, if I were a main character, my first instinct was to warn those family members who could take care of themselves and shield the ones that couldn’t. The next was to envision the worst possible scenario for the rest of the world. 

 

What would your MC have done?

Cheryl Van Eck

 

Three Things:

 

Another “quick” question, at the end of a summer’s madness, to help us refocus (borrowed from The Graceful Lie by Michael Petracca, one of my favorite writing books):  List some of your literary heroes.

 

To delve farther, answer these related questions as well: Would I like to write in a style that emulates any of these people? Are there certain types of writing that I don’t particularly like and would prefer to avoid emulating?

 

 

Brenda Bensch

Kyra Leigh, Queen Bee

Have been behind on posting for the blog.
That is because I’ve had a crazy few weeks.

First off, I got an agent! I can’t believe it. People are actually reading my book. People who might want to actually publish it!

I moved up to Salt Lake county. {I’m at the Library right now. It was difficult to find, but I managed}

I don’t have internet at my house. That is one of the reasons why I haven’t been able to post.

Writing ideas are trying to make their way out of my brain. I’m not sure if they are good ones, but at least I’m trying to write. I’m worried everything is bad and that I’m going to disappoint Steve. I’m already worried about something that hasn’t happened yet. Sounds about right.

I’m leaving for my trip to Florida in just a few weeks.

I am struggling to find a part time job. Being poor is hard. But I have just been telling all my new friends that I’m a “starving artist.” It’s not as fun as it sounds.

My lack of sleeping has come back. And I’ve been having nightmares. Not sure what this is from, but it isn’t great.

But overall I am very happy with how my life is going. And nothing feels better than telling people that I have an agent, and that I am actually a real writer.

Woohoo

I wish I had a peach tree. Or maybe just a peach.

Today in the early morning I was on a walk with my baby boy on my back.

We saw a peach fallen from someone’s tree.

I wanted to eat it.

I also wanted the lady who owned the house to come out in a house dress and curlers and blue lips, screaming and threatening to cast a spell on me if I took one teeny tiny bite. 

I wanted the spell to horrible. 

I wanted to plead with her that I thought she wouldn’t mind. That I hadn’t eaten for days. That the other baby in my belly was a girl and I’d heard that girls need peaches to come out sweet.

I wanted the lady to tell me that her peaches were made of tears and heartbreak and molasses and anyone who ate them would have a life of sadness and misery and only crumbles of joy.

I wanted to hold the peach to my lips and watch as her hand trembled.

I wanted to open my mouth and feel the fur on my tongue, taste the nothing of the peel and imagine the juice that would spray once I bit. 

I wanted her to cry. Don’t do it.

Don’t do it.

Don’t do it.

And then I wanted to . . . 

 

What would you do? What would your MC do? And what would happen afterwards? And what if a semi-truck came along right then and splashed mud and water all over the both of you and she shrunk into a puddle of green and you grew into a Christmas tree with a baby in your belly and baby on your back and every year people would come decorate you and tell the tale of the woman and her two babies who dared to almost eat the peach from the evil woman who lived in the house with the curlers and the house dresses and the trembling hand that gave everything away? 

What would you do?