Of all the aspects of writing, POV (Point of View) has always been a mystery to me.
I recently sent some pages (a start of a novel I’m fiddling with) to an editor for his opinion. He sent back with some changes, saying that I tend to “slide into different points of view.”
I’d always thought that there were three points of view: first person (I); second person (you–seldom used accept in the novel Bright Lights, Big City and a handfull of others); 3rd (she/he).
Turns out I use “omniscient narrator” a lot, which isn’t really point of view, but rather “narrator perspective.” Now, I’m confused.
But, this editor (his professional name is The Book Butcher), helped me tremendously.
Turns out that maybe I live my life in omniscient narrator; i’m often feeling like I’m on the outside watching people, looking at the action and telling it rather than showing.
Here’s what I sent him (first paragraph):
It hadn’t rained for over 60 days, and the Western Colorado ranchers and farmers temperatures had kept pace with the rising thermometers. Some blamed the KREX weather girl, some blamed God, but no matter who they blamed, not a drop fell from the sky. The farmers needed the rain, the corn needed it, the melons, the peaches.
Here’s what he sent back (same paragraph in first person “close” point of view instead of first person “omniscient.”
It hadn’t rained for over sixty days, and to Rae it felt as if the heat had settled into western Colorado the same way it settled into her bones. Every day the thermometer climbed, and every day locals found someone new to blame: the weather girl, failed cloud seeding, God, anyone–but Rae only knew one thing for sure: the sky stayed empty. No rain. Not for the farmers, not for the corn or the melons or the peach trees she passed on her drives.
One more mystery solved.
Now, if the Book Butcher would write the rest of the book for me.
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