Hi Meg,

So glad this resonated with you! And yes, I’m a big believer in figuring out what works for us, our stories, and our goals for both of those. 🙂 Thanks for stopping by!

Yes, between burnout and special projects, I’ve been quieter than usual. Plus, I was in a major 3-car accident this past spring that I’m still trying to recover from, so that certainly didn’t help, but I’m getting there! 🙂

Great example, Becca! I think most people have some “trauma triggers” and would feel better about reading stories with those elements if we knew the storytelling wouldn’t force us too close to the trauma. Thanks for sharing!

Hi Ruchama,

Interesting! I’ve heard some of the Harry Potter books described similarly. I think that style of omniscient is sometimes called Contemporary Omniscient or Subjective Omniscient (in that it gives a somewhat subjective–rather than objective–experience when it comes to one specific character).

I think that because 3rd-person POV is a spectrum, our choices can be much broader than what we hear about, just because the spectrum doesn’t fit into the neat little boxes that advice articles tend to focus on. (No fault of the articles(!), as advice is easier to understand if we ignore the edge cases that can add confusion and complications.)

This is why I wanted to mention in the last section about focusing on the reader experience. If the POV we choose gives readers the experience we want them to have, AND we’re consistent with how we use POV (so as to not confuse or take readers out of the story), then we don’t have to worry about how we’d “label” our POV. If it works, it works. 🙂 Thanks for sharing!

Ooh I like “close POV”. It feels intimate without being too overwhelming, lol. Thanks for the book rec too! 😀 Yeah I think I’m winging it too much and would benefit from studying the POVs more intentionally.

P.S. Happy to hear from you again! 🙂 Long time no talk!

Hi Sieran,

Yes! There is a spectrum between omniscient and deep POV for 3rd-person.

It’s often called “close” or “limited” POV, as it tends to follow a certain character “closely” and/or “limit” the perspective of the story to a specific character(s)–in contrast to most omniscient. However, unlike with deep POV, the lines of narrative, description, etc. can be in an author’s voice, so more objective information can be shared. Filtering words, emotion words, thought tags, etc. are also allowed.

There’s a book called “The Power of Point of View” by Alicia Rasley that I read years ago that really helped me understand the whole spectrum idea, broadening my idea of our POV options. 🙂 (Even better? The majority of the book is not about deep POV.) I think she has it available for free on her website: http://www.aliciarasley.com/index.php/the-power-of-point-of-view-get-your-free-digital-copy-here-its-a-gift-from-alicia-rasley/

Wow your post came in just in time! I too have felt the pressure to always use deep POV, even when I tried to rebel against it. For the story I just started writing, I deliberately made my POV a little shallower than what I usually do. It’s not omniscient, as there are some things we don’t know, and some characters’ minds we don’t have access to. But it’s not deep POV, either. It’s more like something in between, maybe midway POV?

I do want to do a bit of ominous future telling, and write summaries to skip over boring details that the reader doesn’t need to know. It’s also helpful for me to tell the reader in advance what a character’s name is before they mention it. That way, it’s easier for me to refer to the different characters, as I often have groups of characters. It can get confusing fast if I don’t use names to nail down which person is saying what in this group dialogue! (Since it’s not always realistic for every character in the scene to mention their name or have someone else call them by their name.)

Sometimes I want to share knowledge that a character is too oblivious to see. So being stuck in their deep POV would really hurt the narrative! I love your examples with the villains and unreliable narrators, too. I hadn’t thought of the point about distancing readers from a traumatic experience! I’ll have to pay more attention to that. Thanks for another insightful post that challenges popular advice. 🙂