On How Lauren Deals with POV
Apr
20
2006

Just a little ditty about point of view. (and a note up front – one of the reasons I don’t write about craft very often is that we all do things differently. Doing things differently doesn’t mean there’s a right or a wrong way. This is just how I do things. There are lots of ways to approach writing. A number of them way better than how I do it. Nonetheless, this is my perspective)

I am not a purist. Up front, I don’t like rules. So I don’t use them very often. As anyone who’s read my books knows, I write in multiple POV. Some people hate that. Some people love that. Most people don’t notice if it’s done right.

Sometimes a scene calls for a single POV for a reason. Sometimes, it calls for multiple POVs for a reason. For me, it’s always about what I want to reveal.

Anyway, I’m just finishing revisions on a book that had a MM scene. At first, I wrote it in the POV of both men and the woman in the shadows watchinig them. As I read back over it, it was jarring. My agent thought so too.

So I thought about it and decided to write it entirely from the POV of woman in the shadows. Because then the scene is really about the person holding the book and watching. And as most of my readers are women, I liked the idea of having a woman’s perspective on a scene where two men are having naughty parts touching. It adds another level to the voyeurism of the scene overall.

Essentially, for me, POV was a tool, not a hindrance. Not a rule.

And as always, your mileage may vary because this is all about the individual writer and we all do things differently for a whole host of reasons.

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