My Baen Books debut novel Threading the Needle came out a few weeks ago. One of the questions I've been asked about it is why I chose to write it exclusively from Talia's viewpoint, but made it third person rather than first person and if that was a conscious choice.
Threading the Needle is my first single-viewpoint novel--my Ravages of Honor trilogy has multiple viewpoint characters and dual protagonists.
It was not the choice to write a single protagonist (Talia) that drove the adoption of single viewpoint, however.
It was (a) the challenge of it (I try to challenge myself to do/learn something new with each title) and (b) the expected word-count. After 20+ titles (novellas, novelettes, short stories) I know myself as a writer.
Multiple viewpoints make for larger stories since I tend to develop all the viewpoint characters. I don't use throwaway viewpoints where I give you one character's perspective so we get some datum and then never use that character again. I may in the future, but in general I don't because it makes for a disjointed narrative. I put down books that do this all the time.
I also knew that I had a better chance of having my book published if I stuck to a 120,000-word limit (Baen's stated preference IIRC). Needle is the shortest novel I've ever written (my RoH series novels are 150,000-160,000 words). And it paid off, not just because it was published, but because I learned a lot in the writing of it. It forced me to consider structural choices that I otherwise would not have. The enforced discipline can work for you. And there were definitely times when I reconsidered it because it made Needle more of a challenge to write. I was very tempted to pre-chew the readers' food for them at times.
Before I get into how I think it would have made it a different book and what structural reconsiderations I had to use, let's talk definitions.
There are four (five actually) main narrative schemas (some people call them viewpoints, although that is not entirely correct; you'll see why in a second) in use today. Some, like the objective one (sometimes mistaken for omniscient) have gone out of style.
So let's start with it. The gray area represents what's on the page and that the voice (except the spoken dialogue) is that of the camera, i.e. the author-narrator.
This is a true movie-camera perspective and does not give us any internalizations, just what can be observed. As a result, panning the camera as it switches angles can lead to information flow issues and reader confusion. It is one of the reasons it's not used much or used only for "establishing shots" where there is a short overview and then the writer switches to omniscient.
This is what most people mean by omniscient narration:
Not a true movie-camera perspective, this type of narration floats viewpoint from one character to another and the narrative itself (except for spoken dialogue) is that of the author-narrator. The author-narrator is free to observe the mindset (summarize it in his own voice) but not to use character-narrator voice as direct internal monologue (i.e. head-hops).
Like objective, the panning of the camera can be problematic and there is the added problem of floating viewpoint. If the writer doesn't know how to float viewpoint the reader is left wondering which character's perspective is being used (this is a loss of viewpoint, not a head-hop). Both Dean Koontz and Nora Roberts often write in omniscient and are masters at floating viewpoint. They are so good at it that you don't even realize it or you think they're writing close narration.
Both the objective and omniscient narrative schemas use third person pronouns and that is one reason they are mixed up with each other as well as the next two schemas: third limited and third close.
Third limited is the one most used in science fiction because it (allegedly) fixes the information flow and loss of perspective/viewpoint problems that tend to creep into omniscient and objective.
Here, the camera focuses on only one character at a time. There is no floating of viewpoint and hopefully no head-hops either. The camera angle switch is signaled by a change in scene, i.e. three asterisks or a double blank line (now made problematic by formatting paragraphs separated by additional lines). It is a misnomer to say that one scene is written from Red's viewpoint and another from Blue's because the narrative voice is that of the author-narrator. It's the author-narrator limiting (that's why it's called third limited) the perspective to one camera angle, i.e. one character at a time. (Keep reading to third close and you'll see the difference.)
This allows the writer to convey information to the reader that the character does not know, which is why it's so often used in science fiction and fantasy where explantations are needed. If Red is a caveman, she's not going to know about the meteor that destroyed the dinosaurs, but the writer can still explain that to the reader because it is his/her voice that is narrating (hence the term, author-narrator voice).
Since this schema uses third person pronouns, it too is often mistaken for omniscient or objective, especially if the writer hops heads or otherwise violates viewpoint.
Then we have third close, the narrative schema used in Threading the Needle.
Do note how different it is than the other three. The voice/narration on the page is that of the character, i.e. character-narrator voice. If the character doesn't know it, neither does the reader, and that includes anything that might happen in the future, that's behind her and she can't see or didn't hear, and anything in the past that she doesn't know (like if she's a caveman, she couldn't tell us about the meteor).
It is the closest type of narration (yes, closer than first, you'll see why momentarily) because the story unfolds for the reader in real time. All discovery in the story takes place along with the character and as such, anything the character does know, the reader must as well. So, if they know that they are the murderer they are pretending to chase, the reader must know too, otherwise it's a viewpoint violation.
Like third limited, you can switch perspectives, i.e. change to Blue's viewpoint. What's different is the voice. There is no author-narrator narration (voice) in third close. The author is not supposed to exist. Anything from the author (like understanding words in a foreign language the character doesn't know) is authorial intrusion.
Third-close is my favorite schema to write. It is intimate, it puts the reader inside the character's head and heart, it allows the reader to become the character(s). And it means I don't have to pre-chew the readers' food, i.e. tell you what to think or feel. A boon for both of us, I assure you.
When you have multiple viewpoint characters it allows you to put the reader ahead of the characters and creates tension. It allows you to cut off a scene at an emotional high-point and then switch character-narrators and that makes the reader keep turning the pages. It also creates an ongoing low-level of tension since it gives us the character's internalizations. Tension exists and characterization happens when characters think one thing, but do another, or when you know that they feel a certain way and are wondering if they'll act on the feelings or not.
But, a third-close narrative is not JUST a first-person narrative with the pronoun switched out. Third-close is linear. First person is not.
First-person narration is also known as dual narration, because it's the narrator's recount of something that has already happened, i.e. the story is over and we're getting their memory of it. The voice is that of the older, wiser character-narrator. It is distant in time and filtered more heavily.
The character-narrator knows how it will end (just like the omniscient author-narrator or objective presence) but is withholding that information from the reader. Because of this, it is more distant. It may "feel" close, but there is greater narrative distance between the reader and the story because the story is being filtered twice. First through the character in the story and then through the older narrator's memory. This allows us to tell the reader things that the character did not know at the time the story was happening. The presence of that retrospective older, wiser, voice is an additional filter.
Had I written Talia as an older, wiser narrator who was telling us what had happened, I could have violated linearity in the story and I could have told the reader things that Talia did not know at the time that the story was unfolding. The point of the retrospective narrator is to impart some wisdom that the younger self did not have and to comment and pontificate on past events. It also allows the writer to drop in information that the character did not know at the time and this is one reason why it's so often used in detective fiction.
But what about sequels? Going forward, did I want to limit myself to one protagonist doing retrospective narration? Would it be too jarring to switch from dual retrospective narration to single linear? I thought it might be, so that's another reason I went for third-close.
Notice that I did use first person retrospective, and specifially for these reasons, in Relics, the Threading the Needle tie-in short story on Baen's website (https://www.baen.com/relics). In Relics, due to the short format, I needed that retrospective narrator to give us opinions and commentary that I did not have time to develop otherwise. It has that sci-fi noir tone partly because of the narrative schema.
So how would Needle have been different if it would have been multiple viewpoint? You would have gotten parallel action lines as they were happening, i.e. what the minor characters were doing off-screen, instead of having to wait for it and have it recounted to Talia, and by extension, to you as readers. It means that everything that was off-screen for the finale was shuffled off to the resolution. Unlike a movie, we don't get to cut back and forth because that can be very disorienting on a page. I would have either had to suddenly go to omniscient narration (and since I'm not Koontz or Roberts, I'm not going to do that) or to cut back and forth between multiple perspectives.
Would it have made for a better story? It might have imparted more tension in the reader since cutting to scenes from the other characters' viewpoints throughout would have told us what was happening to Lyle (Talia's old partner) while Talia was away. But doing so would not have allowed us to experience Talia's gut-churning uncertainty about what was happening to him. We would have known and NOT been uncertain, even if she was.
The single viewpoint narrative allowed me to focus on Talia's loyalty, one of the things that David Weber said stood out for him in the story. It is high praise indeed, when someone who is not a combat veteran gets complimented for nailing the "war buddy" aspect of relationships, when you have actual female combat vets e-mail you about how much of themselves they saw in Talia.
I didn't set out to do this. I set out to provide an authentic, immersive experience via the close, deep, and tight narration. I set out to write a story not just about veterans but one that would both honor and entertain them.
I will close this by saying that I am humbled and honored by combat veterans reaching out to me to tell me that Talia's experience came across the way that it did.
That is why I write. That is what I write/live for. And it tells met hat I made the right narrative choice.
(Blog Owner's Note: If you're interested on more articles on the craft of writing, check out Ms. Foster's Substack So You Wanna Be A Writer at https://monalisafostertheauthor.substack.com/ . I myself have a subscription and it's definitely worth your time.)
Threading the Needle is available for purchase at the following link. If you click the link and buy literally anything from Amazon I get a small percentage at no additional cost to you.
Well done!
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