The Wonderful World Of Wattpad: Writing Tips and Writing Rants

POV

For those of you who may be wondering, POV stands for point of view. I touched upon this briefly about two chapters ago but I promised I would have a more in depth segment on this later. I  don't think I've read too many tips/ rant books that have touched on point of views the way I'm going to address this but I'll leave it up to you to let me know if I've mentioned anything different or missed a few things.

Let's start with the basics. Somewhere around 4th grade your were taught about point of views. The average person, writer or other wise, is aware that there are three main point of views. In case you've forgotten, let's review:

1st person: 

This is the most personal point of view. It uses the pronouns I, me, and mine. Usually stories that are written in first person are told from the main character(s) point of view. It is used to tell their personal experiences and thoughts.

2nd person: 

This point of view uses the pronouns you and we. This is probably the least important POV as it is rarely ever used. If you have reached high school or college you will know that professors will slaughter your term papers if you use the 2nd person. In fact, by the time you reach high school or college you will probably wonder why your 4th grade teacher even bothered to teach you  2nd person POV if you're not allowed to use it and rarely encounter it.

3rd person: 

This point of view uses pronouns such as they, them, he and she. It is usually told from the point of view of an unknown narrator.  But there's a catch; there's two different types of 3rd person:

Limited:

3rd person limited is just what it's name implies, limited. A limited 3rd person POV is aware of the thoughts, feelings and motives of  a limited number of characters. Usually this type of third person gives away the thoughts and feelings of say, the main protagonist, their love interest, and the antagonist  but shuts out the feelings and motives of the rest of the characters . Limited is pretty smart and knows a lot but not everything.

Omniscient: 

3rd person omniscient is the know-it-all. This point of view is aware of the thoughts and feelings of everyone  involved in the story, even that guy who was just walking down the street and saw that couple leaving in the alley. There are no secrets with Omniscient; everyone's feelings are put on display.

So, now that we've reviewed the different types of point of views I'm going to talk about some of the things I've seen in stories regarding them.

1. Multiple character POVs.( I mean multiple)

You're reading a story in 1st person POV. Hadley, the main character is expressing her thoughts about meeting her boyfriend Harry's family from the first time. After hearing Hadley's thoughts we switch to Harry's POV about how beautiful Hadley looks today. Then we switch to Harry's sister's POV about how  Hadley sounds kind of cool but she's getting sunburn by sitting out by the pool with no sunscreen. Then we switch to the random girl a few pool chairs away's POV about how hot Harry looks  in his yellow swim trunks. Then we switch to Harry's curl's POV about how it's blazing hot outside and they are having terrible frizz from the humidity.

Okay, I'm totally exaggerating here but everyone know's what I mean. We've all read that story that switches POV's several times through out the story and between several different characters. Even characters that have NO name or are NOT even relevant to the story. It's quite confusing, totally annoying and not to mention excessive. I understand if you're wanting to express the POV of other characters around you but it's not appropriate to have so many POV's especially if the story is written in first person. If you want more than just the main character(s) POV known then  3rd person (limited or otherwise) would be appropriate.