Fantasy Book Club discussion

It really annoys me when i am reading a series and im just starting to get used to reading from 1 main characters point of view, or a few characters point of view and then a few books into the series more and more characters seem to pop out of thin air and im then having to keep track of lots of characters. This is just my personal opinion but either start with a few point of view characters and stick with for the entire series, or start with multiple point of view characters from the start. Is it just me that finds this annoying ?

Zayne wrote: "It bothered me when I first started reading books like that too. Before, there would be 2 or 3 povs and that was it for the whole series, but then I started reading books where there were a billion..."

Most of the time i can continue reading the series without any problems, like with malazan or wheel of time, but sometimes it puts me off the rest of the series.

I don't mind many POVs in a series, as long as they're interesting characters.

It gets tedious. Especially when you can't remember which character is which, or the author just throws in a random pov.

Ian wrote: This is just my personal opinion but either start with a few point of view characters and stick with for the entire series, or start with multiple point of view characters from the start.

If, in a single novel, the author sets up the expectation that you're going to have just one or two viewpoint characters, but then later on goes against that expectation, that's bad writing. It means the author didn't plan ahead, and worse, couldn't be bothered to do a rewrite to make the thing consistent.

However, in a series I think you have to cut the author some slack. A series can easily get much bigger than the author's original idea, and new POV characters may be needed.

I'm with Femmy, I don't mind many POV's. In fact, it's quite exciting to get someone new so you start wondering how they fit in the story-line.

"However, in a series I think you have to cut the author some slack. A series can easily get much bigger than the author's original idea, and new POV characters may be needed. "

I am currently writing a series and the issue of POV has been quite a headache.
Chris, you are right; a series can get much bigger than first intended and other things come into consideration. For example, in the second book I take the main character out of the original location. But we still need to know what's happening in that location so I need another character to tell us and thus have a new POV.

I don't think any author just adds POVs for the hell of it. I guess its a matter of personal taste whether a reader likes multiple POVs or not. I couldn't stand them in ASOIAF at first but loved them once I got used to them.

I don't mind multiple POVs in a single story. What I do mind is when the author switches POVs but doesn't make it clear so it's not until I'm halfway down the page that I realize I'm actually in someone else's head.

I enjoy multiple characters best when the author is able to tie their threads into the central protagonists. If what they are doing bears directly on the matter at stake for the original plotline, AND the secondary characters are interesting in their own right, then it works for me.

When the central thrust of the series gets pulled sidewards into a tangential direction because the secondary character (often of lesser interest) takes the stage away from the issue at hand for the main protagonists, that risks losing me.

It really depends. If each of those characters have a distinctive personality, then it's easier to keep track of them. When you start adding in more and there's nothing special about them, then yeah you start wondering why they are there and it's easy to forget them.

I guess I'm weird. I get more annoyed when a book, or series, is entirely from a single point of view. If it's a strong first person point of view, staying in their head for that long can get tiresome. But if it were mixed up so different chapters were from different points of view, that would add some variety.

I mind too many points of view because the story loses focus.

To be sure, when the series is actually one long story, it's almost bound to lose focus.

I actually like it when one book, or a large part of it, is from one character's POV and then later you get to see things, including the original character you think you've gotten to know, from another perspective.

To me, it's all in the skill of the author. Some do it very well and some do it poorly. I'm not the biggest fan of 1st person, though.

Depends on the story too. Some require the deep identification with one character. Some require the dramatic irony of seeing the situation through many eyes.

It really depends. What I detest is when characters pop up, take up huge amounts of space, but then do absolutely nothing to advance the plot or world building. Quite often, it seems like an exercise in padding the story out.

Chris wrote: "Ian wrote: This is just my personal opinion but either start with a few point of view characters and stick with for the entire series, or start with multiple point of view characters from the start..."

On the contrary: if the writer is able to set up an expectation and then defy it, that's good writing! Multiple POVs are most effectively precisely when they're unexpected: you're lulled into seeing things from one perspective only, and then forced to reconfront things from a different direction. It challenges the reader.

For instance, one reason why ASOS is the best of Martin's books is the introduction of its new POVs - it's not just a matter of Martin having to introduce a new one because of a plot complication, it's a POV that totally changes how you feel about a character, and about a lot of other things as a result. It wouldn't have worked if they'd been a POV from the beginning, and the series would have been much the worse if they hadn't been a POV in the third book.

I haven't read the Martin book, so I can't comment on it. It is of course true that really good writers can sometimes break the rules and get away with it.

However...

I have just read B.V.Larson's To Dream with the Dragons, which is a good example of what I mean. The first third of the book has a character called Therian as the POV character. "Fine," you think, "this is Therian's story." Then the rest of the book has Gruum, a different character, as the POV character. Why? You tell me. I was left asking myself: whose story is this meant to be?

I'm now reading Graham Joyce's Some Kind Of Fairy Tale. In chapter 8, we suddenly have an earlier part of the story retold from the viewpoint of a new POV character. You need a damned good reason to do something like this: to not merely retell events you've already told, but to also switch viewpoints. It stops the narrative flow in its tracks - indeed, makes it go backwards. I find myself thinking, "You told me this already, for f--k's sake get on with the story, I want to know what happened next."

Maybe I'm a really low-brow kind of reader, and this kind of thing zooms over my low-brow head. All I really know is that I want three things out a novel: to find out what happens next, to care about what happens to at least some of the characters, and to understand what's going on. For me, therefore, the ideal POV character is someone I can empathise with, who has a good view of events, and is directly involved in most of them. Not all stories can be told like that, of course, but that's my ideal, and I feel that an author needs a damned good reason to depart from it.

I agree with most of the comments posted, if the author writes the characters well i dont mind multiple points of view, or if the author writes new characters in they need to be entertaining and have a good storyline. I do prefer single pov characters like the dresden files, but i am open to reading multiple pov's

I don't mind multiple POVs in a story, as long as they have their open chapter so it's clear to me that it's a new chapter, it's a new POV. What I dislike is when you have different POV's within a chapter and sometimes it's unclear which character is relating the story. I haven't come across this in fantasy as far as I can recall, but have in other genres.

Angela wrote: "I don't mind multiple POVs in a story, as long as they have their open chapter so it's clear to me that it's a new chapter, it's a new POV. What I dislike is when you have different POV's within a ..."

I think this is a good point. Starting a new chapter, or at least delineating it very clearly with scene breaks, is essential.

L.G. wrote: "I think this is a good point. Starting a new chapter, or at least delineating it very clearly with scene breaks, is essential."

That's something that drove me crazy in one I read recently -- I think it was an eBook formatting issue, but it didn't always have a double line break at a POV shift so I'd get half-way through the paragraph before I realized it had changed.

Joseph wrote: "L.G. wrote: "I think this is a good point. Starting a new chapter, or at least delineating it very clearly with scene breaks, is essential."

That's something that drove me crazy in one I read rece..."

I've noticed that in a number of eBooks, actually. I think it has something to do with the process that people go through to make their eBook. Basically, eBooks run off html (and some other stuff), so a lot of people just go to "save as html" for their Word document, but the html that produces is just beyond hideous.

I'd be a bit of a hypocrite if I said I hated multiple POVs, but I will admit that it's challenging if not done correctly (myself included).

Personally, I enjoy it, though as others have mentioned, I find it challenging when they do the headswitch w/o a notable break (whether that be a new chapter or simply a "scene break" (not sure what exactly that double space common between POV or scene switches would be called.

I find the switch to give me a new person to learn about, a new angle to look at the developments. If it's a character I don't enjoy, I also know that it won't last forever and can skim until I get back to the character I love.

I don't mind the switch as long as I know I've switched, as has been said. It seems much harder to do this mid chapter in an e-book.

Well, there's definitely a difference between presenting multiple POV and 'head-hopping'. Planned POV changes usually happen from chapter to chapter or at least with a noticeable break like a set of stars or double lines. 'Head-hopping' is when you're in one character's head, and in the next paragraph, with no warning, you're in someone else's, and then you switch back. That's unprofessional and drives me nuts.

I'm not a huge GoT fan, but he does the multiple POV correctly, basing an entire chapter on one character and never slipping into allowing that character to see or know things that could only be known by someone else. otherwise, bouncing around from head-to-head is confusing and gives the impression that the author can't figure out how to reveal information by staying in a single viewpoint.

Of course, then there's the omniscient, who can tell you everyone's thoughts in every scene. But then you have to have a narrator who knows all and tells all that's need -- and you have to make it clear to readers who aren't accustomed to that trope.

I love multiple POVs, as long as they are somewhere between 3 and a billion, haha!

Seriously, I really loved GRRM's first 3 books and felt that we already had plenty of POVs to keep me entertained. Then, at the beginning of the fourth (A Feast For Crows), he started up a completely new plotline with some people I couldn't find it in my heart to care about. I felt like I had a ton invested in all the other characters and wanted to find out what had happened to them, not start anew with a whole new group.

Plus, at some point, it seemed like he kept adding more and more characters in a kind of formulaic way: Name, house, emblem, colors. I felt like I needed a spreadsheet to keep up with it all.

I would love to go back and pick up where I left off in the series, but I fear perhaps that ship has sailed :(

It started out GREAT though! I was glued to books 1-3.

L.G. wrote: "It really depends. What I detest is when characters pop up, take up huge amounts of space, but then do absolutely nothing to advance the plot or world building. Quite often, it seems like an exerci..."

Completely agree!

I always liked The Dwarves series by Markus Heitz because he handles multiple POVs very well, giving each one a new chapter, their location, time and date. Although there isn't as many characters as in GRRM's books ( how can there be?!) I still find the style very neat and easy to follow.

I've never done it before with more than 2 or 3 POVs. However, the book I'm working on now has more than 10 so far and may finish with 20 in the first book alone.

It's going to be a massive sprawling saga so the many points of view help me keep it flowing and interesting. Also I tend to be very brief in my writing so it's helping me add depth to the story.

I feel the need to point out that THIS IS NOT the place to talk about your writing or what book you're working on!

I like having different characters as viewpoints, even switching locations. It adds to the depth of the story. As long, that is, that all the characters are in some way, even tangentially, linked to the story, and their chapter or paragraph adds to the story.

T.P. wrote: "I like having different characters as viewpoints, even switching locations. It adds to the depth of the story. As long, that is, that all the characters are in some way, even tangentially, linked t..."

This, so much this. If view points are being put into a story that add nothing, then I find them quite aggravating. On the other hand, adding minor view points to flesh things out can really add to things.

I have to say that I agree with OP. It's weird, too, I never really used to think about it. Now, having considered it a lot because of trying to figure out why ASOIAF and WOT drove me away, I think it's not so much the POV characters as it is the slow pacing that comes from having to get to know a new character and get invested in her emotional journey.

I was hooked to WoT until the end of (I think) A Path of Daggers, when (view spoiler)[Mat gets taken down and then doesn't show up AT ALL in the next book (hide spoiler)]. Having a very key POV character missing for the entirety of a book, especially one who was my personal favorite because of his development through the stories, just killed it for me.

So long as each one propels the narrative, the author can have a cast of thousands and let each one say a word and it would work out.

That's what I was thinking when I read Allegiant. SPOILER! It kind of gave away that Tris was going to die.

I prefer large and ever-expanding casts, personally, provided the characters aren't fired at me too rapidly.