Q&A with Josh Lanyon discussion
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Writing Questions for Josh
Ah, but that is classic Omniscient third - here's a sample from Pride and Prejudice "In a few days Mr. Bingley returned Mr. Bennet's visit, and sat about ten minutes with him in his library. He had entertained hopes of being admitted to a sight of the young ladies, of whose beauty he had heard much; but he saw only the father. The ladies were somewhat more fortunate, for they had the advantage of ascertaining from an upper window that he wore a blue coat, and rode a black horse." But it does have an old fashioned feel, doesn't it?
Could someone please explain the terms for the different POVs and what is what? I'm never sure I get it right...
Dev wrote: "Ah, but that is classic Omniscient third - here's a sample from Pride and Prejudice "In a few days Mr. Bingley returned Mr. Bennet's visit, and sat about ten minutes with him in his library. He had..."Exactly, Dev! A good deal of classic literature employs OPOV. Then . . . some uninformed somebody dreamt up the phrase head hopping, applied it in a disparaging way, and now it's considered anathema.
o_O
Calathea wrote: "Could someone please explain the terms for the different POVs and what is what? I'm never sure I get it right..."The most common POVs in use now are 1st person ("I walked into a bar") and 3rd person limited meaning the narration is in 3rd person (he, she, it) but limited to one person's point of view at a time ("he walked into the bar"). Second person is sometimes used in experimental fiction but it's hard to sustain ("you walked into a bar"). The 3rd omniscient is the way most fiction was written before the 1930's when Hemingway and Fitzgerald started shaking things up. In 3rd omniscient the narrator knows much more than any of the characters, the narrator knows what everyone is thinking, knows the future and past and sometimes interjects bits of that into the narration. Third omniscient is, of course, "a man walked into a bar"
Wikipedia looks good on this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narrativ...
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That's omniscient done really well! As Lou said, done bad, it jerks. But it's more like you're inside someone's head, hearing their thoughts, and your jerked out into the head of the man sitting across from him and now hearing his thoughts without warning.
It's actually 3rd person done very badly. That's more the way I've always thought of it. And I've usually called it POV switching. I think it makes more sense, because you are switching the POV mid-scene or even mid-paragraph without warning to the reader.
Dev wrote: "Calathea wrote: "Could someone please explain the terms for the different POVs and what is what? I'm never sure I get it right..."The most common POVs in use now are 1st person ("I walked into a ..."
In addition, the tense can be past or present.
I've seen second-person narration used, but it is difficult to pull off.
Dev wrote: "In 3rd omniscient the narrator knows much more than any of the characters, the narrator knows what everyone is thinking, knows the future and past and sometimes interjects bits of that into the narration..."That's a very good description, Dev.
Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice is a classic example of a novel where the omniscient POV is subtle (ie not too intrusive) and yet it has a distinct enough 'voice', which often allows for a certain use of irony and detachment between the narrating voice and the characters.
In novels using this type of narration I don't mind it when it's well done and flows smoothly. I admit too it sounds a bit old-fashioned, but it works well in that context.
What I have trouble with is when sometimes, in contemporary fiction, most of the narration in a novel is done for example in 3rd person limited (either keeping the same person's POV throughout, or switching between different characters' POV with each new chapters or change of scene), and then suddenly there's one sentence or part of a sentence that sounds like it's written from an omniscient POV. It jerks me right out of the narration. Like for example when a character is alone in a room, he thinks or remembers something that makes him blush, and the text actually says "he blushes". Unless he's facing a mirror there and then, how can the character 'know' he's blushing, since there's no one else in the room from whose alternative POV the scene can be described? So it must be the omniscient narrator's "intrusion" - temporary as it may be. Sometimes it is so short it can go unnoticed, but when I do notice it, I get distracted and it just breaks the flow of narration for me...since 3rd person limited, which usually sounds more "personal" and "intimate", gets temporarily superseded by a more detached and 'objective' 3rd person omniscient narrator voice that jars with the overall tone of the book.
Right - that's what I think of when I think head jumping - is limited third popping from person to person (or object sometimes) within a scene.
Just as a headlong answer to the original question... I don't like omniscient no matter how correctly it's done. Especially not in romance writing. And yes, that includes P&P.Omniscient is like taking a cinematic view of the action: you are viewing the scene from outside, with a shallow interface into all thoughts. Since my favorite thing ever in any escapist reading is to deeply immerse in a character's situation--seeing through their eyes and feeling what they feel--that pretty much precludes omniscient from ever getting me there.
In a brilliantly written omniscient story, I might say, "the prose was wonderful and the story was so imaginative and the mystery subtle and the ending astonishing, but for some reason, I just never really sank into it."
Reading omniscient is more an intellectual activity than an emotional one (to me).
ETA: Just had the thought (which I might take back later) that omniscient writing has a very Victorian flavor to me-- and I wonder if that's coincidence. It feels repressed.
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Would any of you attempt omniscient? Have you read any recently published work that contained it? I just don't understand why it's so misunderstood and maligned."
This is just my opinion, but there is a big difference between omniscient POV and head-hopping. Omniscient involved a narrator who floats in and out of people's thoughts as suits the story but who maintains a somewhat detached and specific voice throughout the narrative--that of the storyteller, rather than the characters. EM Forster's Maurice is the book I've most recently read in omniscient POV.
Head hopping is something that occurs a lot recently because of the constant POV switches in films and games. It is when there is a very close "over the shoulder camera" 3rd person past tense POV that rapidly switches between characters with no sense of a "narrator" presence who is telling the story and knitting the perspective switches together. Omniscient POV requires a lot of narrative summary in order to work well. Stories with extensive dialogue are not good candidates for omniscient POV.
So I'm going to try and write 2 examples that demo the difference I'm trying to explain.
1. Omniscient
Angelina Faulks thought that Jerry's tie could not possibly have been uglier. Garish, loud and with a paisley pattern so disorganized she could not help but wonder if it were comprised merely of stains, she felt the tie would be better suited as a cat toy than as a garment. While Jerry felt no ill-will toward the cat, and did not wish to deprive her of toys, he felt that Angelina lacked imagination, fashion-wise.
Thus had ensued a long-standing battle over the tie. Each morning Angelina would lay it in Miss Whiskers' bed and each night Jerry would fish it out again, brush the cat fur off and hang it defiantly back on the tie rack.
Miss Whiskers, it should be mentioned, felt nothing for the tie at all and regarded its appearance and disappearance as one less feline might regard passing clouds--that is to say with mild, but fleeting interest.
2. Head Hopping
"Your tie is ugly," Angelina said. She hated the ratty, stained-looking thing.
"Oh, yeah, well since your sense of fashion stopped developing in 1947, I take that as a compliment," Roger returned. Why did she have to be this way? Couldn't she just leave his tie alone?
Angelina waited till Roger had left, grabbed the tie and set it in the cat's bed, hoping that this time it would stay there.
"Hey, here it is again," Miss Whiskers thought to herself, looking at the tie. "...and there it goes..."
Paola wrote: "Like for example when a character is alone in a room, he thinks or remembers something that makes him blush . . ."I know what you mean, Paola (and it happens a lot), but that particular example doesn't bother me. People can feel themselves blush; it isn't really a break in POV.
Mod
I think most modern readers feel the same way. There is something cool about OPOV in, for example, a humorous story, though.
I can't think of a single romance-genre romance that's written in OPOV.
@Nicole:Wow. That was possibly the clearest and most succinct explanation of the difference that I've seen. I want to bookmark it. :)
There is something cool about OPOV in, for example, a humorous story, though.
Right. Of course. One of these days I'll learn to stop talking in absolutes. :) Or maybe I won't.
Nicole wrote: "Oco wrote: "Omniscient is like taking a cinematic view of the action: you are viewing the scene from outside, with a shallow interface into all thoughts. Since my favorite thing ever in any escapis..."Jeff Erno's Trust Me is written in omniscient POV. Not a regular romance though, more like a YA romantic book.
Nicole wrote: "I can't think of a single romance-genre romance that's written in OPOV."Not a recent one, anyway. It's too distancing. Hm. I'll have to rethink that story of mine. (Still, it seems many readers have an imperfect understanding of the difference between OPOV and random POV jumps. It's probably best to avoid OPOV in this genre.)
Oco wrote: "Just had the thought (which I might take back later) that omniscient writing has a very Victorian flavor to me-- and I wonder if that's coincidence. It feels repressed. "Possibly because while an OPOV can float among characters' thoughts, it would be much more disorienting for the reader if the narrator tried to get into all their bodies as well, relating what they were feeling against their skin. That's why it wouldn't work in this genre.
Kari wrote: "I knock together a rough synopsis of how the story will go in the prelims stage. Just so I know how the story holds together in broad brushstrokes."*in awe* sounds sensible and organised:)
As much as I keep telling myself I should do that ... it just doesn't work for me.
Sometimes I'm a little jealous how organised some people can write, mostly after finishing a first draft, but then I start editing and it all comes together and I'm remembring that there is more than one way to get to Rome :)
Anne wrote: "But you did a great job after all the blood, sweat and tears. :) "literally, I'm not proud to admit.
Still, I dread having to do that again ... and again ... and again, even though I know I will.
Jordan wrote: "I... forgot what I was going to say about writing a synopsis. Oh yeah! I think it varies. Sometimes I have good luck writing one at the start and having it stay true. When writing something that's ..."I only once posted something in serial ... and the poor boy is still lying in hospital ... (aka story unfinished)
After that (and stumbling across a number of unfinished serials I liked) I vowed never to do that again!
K.Z. wrote: "Would any of you attempt omniscient? Have you read any recently published work that contained it? I just don't understand why it's so misunderstood and maligned. "I've read it ... though I couldn't give you examples
but I couldn't write it myself. Omniscient is an art in itself, one that I just don't think I can pull off.
I try to stick to 3rd limited (or 1st) and try to keep the number of characters down as well.
I do have one first draft with five povs changing per scene, of which one appears only a couple of times. No idea whether I'm going to keep it that way when I ever get back to editing it.
The whole blushing thing - I sometimes write it the way that drives people crazy and I change the wording when someone points it out - but I have to tell you that I don't really buy that I need to say "I could feel myself blushing" rather than "I blushed", simply because we do know when we're blushing and we don't think "I can feel myself blushing", we think "OMG I'm blushing, that's so embarrassing"
Thanks all for explaining! I've seen the head hopping (switching 3rd POV)called omniscient and couldn't quite believe that this was right. That's were my trouble with POVs began, beause I've never been sure which term to use.
When I think of omniscient I think epic fantasy novels, a thousand and more pages. 1st person is connected (at least in my head) with PI-stories.
I remember that only a couple of years ago I knew a lot of readers on another website that would say that they didn't like 1st person narration because the POV was to limited and they wouldn't know what the other characters thought and felt. Maybe that is also a reason for this switching POV?
Dev wrote: "The whole blushing thing - I sometimes write it the way that drives people crazy and I change the wording when someone points it out - but I have to tell you that I don't really buy that I need to ..."The only recourse for writers is to go ahead with what they know is correct, regardless of how others perceive it. Right is right, after all.
Calathea wrote: "I remember that only a couple of years ago I knew a lot of readers on another website that would say that they didn't like 1st person narration because the POV was to limited and they wouldn't know what the other characters thought and felt. Maybe that is also a reason for this switching POV? ."POV switching is really just a shortcut because if you take enough time and are skilled, readers will know what other characters are thinking and feeling without writing from their pov. I felt I knew most of what Jake Riordan was thinking and feeling by the end of the Adrien English series, but it did take 5 books to get to that point.
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I had that problem once. Back when I was writing fanfic, I found a new fandom to write in after abandoning two others. But I made myself go back and finish the outstanding stories I had left undone before I even posted the first story in the new fandom. I have to say, writing serials can be a lot of fun. Especially when you're getting instand awesome feedback. But it helps to love what you're writing. Going back and forcing myself to finish was like pulling a tooth without painkillers. But I did it. lol, and the one story got a lot of awesome reviews. People wanted more from me in that fandom and I just couldn't give it to them.
Thankfully, when I left the last fandom, I left nothing unfinished. I told people I'd been planning on writing four more stories for the fandom, but those never got beyond the basic planning stage, so it wasn't that terribly bad that I abandoned them. Though I still wish I could have finished those four. lol.
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Sometimes it's fun to try and figure out what they're thinking too.
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Ha! I didn't see this before I departed on my vacation, but yes. I think that would be very informative.
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Welcome to zee dark side! :-D
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Sadly, this is a case of a little learning is a dangerous thing. Many readers -- even many young editors (especially in digitial). Honestly don't know the difference between head-hopping and omniscient. They think it's all the same thing.
Partly that's because omniscient has fallen so out of favor (the current trend is for a very tight, personal and limited third person POV) that it stands out and readers mistake it for an error (unless it's in a prestigious press literary novel in which case they know it can't have been a mistake). :-D
And then the other part of the problem is that so few people write or edit omniscient that it's becoming rare for someone to be able to do it well.
I think it works best in historicals (Georgette Heyer comes to mind) and humor (Wodehouse, Thurber).
I'd say go for it. I love to see writers pushing themselves and the boundaries of genre fiction.
Mod
I think the best way to do omniscient is to try and think of the omniscient voice as another character, observing, all-seeing, all-knowing -- AND (this is the tricky bit) with its own voice which is either straight informative narrator or humorous commentator.
I think that might help writers unclear about the difference between omniscient POV and wavering POV.
Josh wrote: "I think the best way to do omniscient is to try and think of the omniscient voice as another character, observing, all-seeing, all-knowing -- AND (this is the tricky bit) with its own voice which is either straight informative narrator or humorous commentator.I think that might help writers unclear about the difference between omniscient POV and wavering POV.."
Like the narrator in Our Town (except, argh that's a horrid play)
Mod
No, I think this is incorrect. This is where people are getting confused because they're trying to take it too far. You know if you're blushing or not. You feel your face get hot, you feel that little prickle at the back of your neck, you feel the blood rush -- however you want to describe it, we all know when we are blushing or redenning or flushing or whatever you want to call it.
We also know what our expressions feel like -- we know when we are making a particular expression. Or what we imagine is a particular expression. Me thinking I look kindly and sympathetic is liable to look nervous to an observer, but we all have our arsenal of expressions, facial and tone, we all interpret what we see. Not always correctly -- tears can be for happiness or sorrow, but we are certainly aware we are crying.
Does that make sense?
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Bingo.
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..."
Why should you? None of us do! :-D
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..."
Changing to first person POV is an exercise I sometimes give mentorees if they're having problems digging into character or with POV. It very often breaks the ice.
But it is definitely tricky for the reason you mention -- it takes a lot of effort to show what the other characters are feeling. In fact, the challenge is often to show the reader what the other character is feeling, yet believably have the POV character miss the clues. It's hard work.
It does work very well for detective fiction where the POV character is naturally limited in his access to information.
Welcome back, Josh! Hope you're all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. ;-)I read with interest your recent comments on another thread, but I thought this one would be more appropriate for any follow-up.
I'm curious about your take on erotic content. I find myself less and less interested in it, both as a writer and a reader, and more involved in character exploration and development. BUT, I have the feeling I can kiss any future in this genre goodbye if I don't make myself push the sexual-content envelope. A majority of m/m readers seem to crave sex, especially kinky sex. BDSM is wildly popular right now, even if it borders on noncon and torture.
Have you felt any overt or covert pressure to steam up your stories? How would you advise writers to deal with it? I suppose the logical first step is deciding what's more important: making money, or following one's personal muse. (I hate that term -- it sounds so pretentious! -- but I can't think of a better one.)
Josh wrote: "You know if you're blushing or not. You feel your face get hot, you feel that little prickle at the back of your neck, you feel the blood rush -- however you want to describe it, we all know when we are blushing or redenning or flushing or whatever you want to call it..."Thanks for your views, Josh.
Yes, perhaps most people are aware when they're blushing or not, but it has happened to me in the past sometimes that I was feeling all the 'signs' of an imminent blushing (blood rush, face getting hot etc that you also describe) but then just for laughs I would look at myself in a mirror and notice I wasn't blushing after all, it was all 'internal', apparently LOL. (or the blushing might have appeared for one second and gone away LOL).
Other times, when I am with other people, I've been told I was blushing but I was surprised, because at the time I didn't 'feel' it...
So, what I meant was, unlike other external signs of our emotions, like crying or feeling our heart throb a mile a minute etc. I thought the awareness (or unawareness) of blushing might be more of a subjective feeling, and that's why IMHO in a limited 3rd or 1st person POV narration it sounds more natural to me that the character would say "I/He/She felt myself/himself/herself blushing" than "I/He/She blushed". But of course the second option is not wrong per se, it just sounds more 'objective' to me, and therefore it slightly jars with the concept of a limited person's POV.
For example, from Fatal Shadows:
"This is strictly confidential, Mr. English," Chan warned.
No it's not, I thought. This is another trap of some kind.
"Your life is not in danger, English," Riordan drawled.
I could feel myself turning red with anger.
I think the narrator's choice of words here creates even more tension, as it puts more emphasis on what Adrien is feeling than on whether his anger is actually making him turn red or not. In any case, Jake and Chan inevitably sense Adrien's mounting anger, as it's implied from the tense verbal exchange that follows, and from Jake getting angry too and "unexpectedly" snapping back at Adrien.
Mod
I read with interest your recent comments on another thread, but I thought this one would be more appropriate for any follow-u..."
KZ, I think it really does depend on who you believe your audience to be and what kind of a career you're hoping for.
I believe my audience is a little older and a little smarter than perhaps the average m/m mainliner. I believe they not only like plot and character, they demand it. Not that they don't also enjoy the occasional bit of kink, but it's not the main thing they're looking for and they grow quickly impatient if that's all the book is about.
In other words, I'm writing for readers like myself.
A certain percentage of m/m writers making a name for themselves as kinkmeisters are going to be successful -- maybe even in the long term because porn always sells -- but they're locking themselves into a sub-genre they're going to have trouble getting out of.
Now if they have no desire to write anything else, that's no problem. Money is very nice and if that's all you're concerned with, you're in like Flynn.
But like you, I'm increasingly bored with erotic content, and the idea of writing pages and pages of sex is about as thrilling to me as writing a technical manual. Lucky for me I've managed to get to a point where I can pretty much write what I want and know I can get it published (assuming I don't want to publish it myself -- which I have a feeling I'll mostly do from here on out). It's a long time since anyone pushed me for more erotic content, and I think that might be because my publishers noticed that my readers weren't typically looking for that. My sales are strong without it.
Now and then a reader will complain there wasn't enough of the sexy, and I honestly just chalk that up to they picked up the wrong book. I'm not the writer for them. That's okay. I'm past thinking every reader should love my work.
I guess another question is, can you be taken seriously if you write erotic content. For some readers and in some genres, all erotic content = porn, and the answer to the question is no.
Outside of the romance world, high erotic content means your work is automatically devalued.
Nicole wrote: "Oco wrote: "Omniscient is like taking a cinematic view of the action: you are viewing the scene from outside, with a shallow interface into all thoughts. Since my favorite thing ever in any escapis..."Jemima J: A Novel About Ugly Ducklings and Swans is in OPOV, at least partially. It's been a while since I read it, but it struck me immediately. It's actually a very good book.
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Fantasy, especially large epic scale fantasy, would be perfect for omniscient. Although even the best done omniscient requires breaks with tight third, I think, to keep the story intimate in the places it needs to be less large scale.
Because omniscient is a little distancing, by its very definition.
Josh wrote: "Anne wrote: "Jemima J: A Novel About Ugly Ducklings and Swans is in OPOV, at least partially. It's been a while since I read it, but it struck me immediately. ..."Fantasy, especially large epic ..."
I agree, but strangely, Jemima J is just a regular contemporary, in spite of the name. It's really a good book, with almost no girl cooties.
Mod
.."
It occurred to me that I'm unintentionally tarring everyone who writes kink with the same brush. I was thinking of the question from KZ's perspective -- which is a commercial one.
A lot of writers write tons of sex becasue they enjoy writing tons of sex. That's different. It's no strain on them, they enjoy those explorations.
Or there are writers for whom writing sex is no more interesting and yet no more tiresome than writing about anyone else. They pump it up in their books because it's expected in the genre.
Although...I seem to notice -- or is this wishful thinking? -- that the expectations for our genre have changed. DO publishers really push for more sex scenes? I know some originally did, but our genre has changed quite a bit in the last few years. Are a lot of publishers still insisting that all m/m romance must contain X, Y, & Z?
Or is that merely an author's urban legend?
Sex sells. As awkwardly schizo a society as we are about it, sex sells like crazy. Which can be difficult to accept if you're an ambitious, "serious" writer. The hard fact is that your beautifully crafted little literary masterpiece will likely be outsold by someone else's flaming hot mess of erotica. Let alone someone else's beautifully crafted literary flaming hot mess of erotica.
And I don't have a solution for that because like every other author out there, I do find it frustrating that mediocrity is so often lavishly rewarded merely because (or so it seems) of the kink factor. Or just a whole lotta boinking.
Whatever it is, it's frustrating. But I also know that writing what you don't enjoy writing, trying to crank out something merely because it's potentially commercial creates it's own hell.
I guess it's one of those pick your poisons...
Josh wrote: "Josh wrote: "Now if they have no desire to write anything else, that's no problem. Money is very nice and if that's all you're concerned with, you're in like Flynn..."
It occurred to me that I'm ..."
Well, put it this way: Hersheys always sells better than Godiva dark. :D
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Thanks! I'm happy to be here... I think... uh... is that a REAL demon sitting in the corner over there? Ummmm....
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That sounds about like what I was thinking. Imagine the "narrator" as another character. Just think "Buttler DidIt didn't do it" if you've ever played the Clue video game. That would be VHS game. I tried it once, and the only thing that stuck was the Butlers reminder that even though his name was Butler DidIt, he didn't do it. You can't blame him. He's just the narrator for the story.
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Over the weekend, I was working on something of a plot for a prequel to another book I'm planning, and the (maybe?) opening lines came to me in first person. I rather liked that way of getting into the urban fantasy world, as a great introduction. Whether I take it beyond that into the rest of the story, I don't know, but your idea here just reminded me of another character I've been struggling to write, and I'm wondering if trying a little 1st person, even if he still ends up in 3rd, might be the way to go.
lol, darn it, now you really have me wanting to work on something other than my current WIP.
Yes, publishers still push for more sex. I suspect it's because sexy books sell. It seems to me that the important thing for those of us being pushed (however kindly) to beef it up, is to make sure that the sex is there for a reason. When I realize that many of my own emotional turning points have happened around sex, it's easier for me to include bedroom moments. Usually the scenes were already there and I (perhaps lazily) had faded to black. The trick is also to make every time feel new, which can be a challenge if there's lots of sex going on. I have a friend who talks about some writer in straight fiction who's always using the phrase "the neglected nipple" - which, since it's in every sex scene, has made my friend quit reading the author. Something to watch for....
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I read with interest your recent comments on another thread, but I thought this one would be more appropriate for any follow-u..."
I couldn't agree more. I've never been one for writing a lot of sex in my stories. I planned a few for the current WIP, and then wrote them out. So I was kinda wondering the same thing. Thanks for asking KZ.
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.."
It occurred to me that I'm ..."
That all sounds about right. I've heard the line "write for yourself" and the follow up that goes something like "if YOU like it, chances are good there are others out there who will like it just as much." Though, how many other people, who knows.
But yeah, I can't bring myself to write more sex because it'll simply turn into "tab A into slot B". uck. really. I don't like reading those stories, and I certainly don't like writing them.
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Q&A with Josh Lanyon
Books mentioned in this topic
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The Selfish Gene (other topics)
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Authors mentioned in this topic
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I can't stand it when in one paragraph I'm in one head, the next, I'm in someone else's head, and the third I'm back to the first head, and I have no warning that I'm switching heads. It makes it hard to read because I can't keep the story straight in my head and I have to keep rereading parts to understand what's going on.
The other thing that I've seen very rarely (one book specifically comes to mind and it wasn't a romance, thank God!) is head hopping into too many character's heads. The book I'm thinking of introduced a new character in every chapter. I didn't finish the book. It was well written otherwise, but that was just too much.
But that's just me. Head hopping is one of my pet peeves.