It’s pretty hard to describe the many important decisions an author must make when they start working on a new book, especially when it comes to fiction stories. Voice, themes, tone, genre and imagery are just a few of the literary devices an author must manage.
Not all devices are of equal importance, however. I have always believed that one of the most important aspects of writing a fiction book is deciding what point of view it’s going to be told in.
As I’m sure many know, in writing there are three points of view: first, second and third. For the sake of convenience, I’m not really going to talk about second person point of view. Second-person isn’t really used in fiction stories. Off the top of my head the only example that I can think of are those old choose your own adventure books.
It has recently come to my attention that there is a bit of discord around what point of view a story uses, mainly among the “Booktok” crowd. I’ve seen countless videos of readers complaining about the use of third-person in books, with many of which outright saying that they refuse to read in books that are written in the POV.
I was honestly a bit taken aback by this discoverly. I understand that everyone has their own preferences; I’m not faulting anyone for having an opinion. However, I do find it a bit strange that there’s such a vocal hatred for the POV.
In this article, I want to find out if the hate is justified, or if everyone is just overreacting. I’m going to be comparing their strengths and weaknesses, what makes them unique and how they should be used.
Before we officially get started, I want to say that I have experience writing in both POVs. Much of what I’m talking about will be based around personal works and what I’ve learned from them.
First-person point of view is a way of telling a story from the perspective of a specific character. Pronouns such as “I,” “me,” “myself” and “we” are the most commonly known ones.
First-person is used quite often in our current literary environment. As of right now it’s most common to see it be used in romance and romance-adjacent stories. The “Twilight” series by Stephen Meyer is a pretty good example.
There’s a lot of really interesting things an author can do with a first-person perspective. For instance, first person is often used to limit what the reader knows to only what the narrator knows. This leads me to my favorite reason for using first person: the characters.
First person is able to make a story feel extremely intimate and conversational. The reader is directly involved in the characters’ thoughts; we get to know how they feel before anyone else. This includes things they don’t know.
You can build tension much easier than you can in third person. Both the character and reader are kept in the dark. You’re going through the story together.
As I mentioned before, romance is a great genre for first-person. However, I would make the argument that mystery may be an even better genre for the POV, mainly due to the limited POV the reader has, which in a way, turns them into amateur detectives.
Moving on, next we have third-person point of view. Third person has it where the narrator is not part of the story and instead uses third-person pronouns, like “his” and “her,” to describe the characters’ actions.
Third person is overall seen as a lot less personal than first person. However, that isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
The POV gives us access to multiple characters’ perspectives, which helps the reader to feel more empathetic and attached to them. It’s also much easier to jump around to different scenes, helping build out the world around the characters.
Speaking of world building, third person allows for more detailed scene description, making it the ideal POV for fantasy novels. You’re beyond a single character’s point of view; you can describe everything about a given location, even if they don’t know anything about it.
There are actually multiple types of third-person points of view in writing: omniscient, limited, and objective.
As the name suggests, omniscient has the narrator as this all-knowing being. They have the ability to share the thoughts and feelings of every single character, as well as their own opinions.
Then there’s my personal favorite: limited. The narrator can only see what the protagonist experiences and thinks and perceives other characters through the protagonist’s eyes. If you think that this sounds a lot like first-person, you would be correct. It has all the important elements of first, just with different pronouns.
Lastly, there’s objective. The narrator uses an observational tone and only describes what is seen and heard. The narrator doesn’t usually express or understand the characters’ thoughts or feelings. This one is probably my least favorite out of the three. I personally think that a story needs to be somewhat biased for the sake of it’s story.
Third-person works really well with fantasy and sci-fi stories. The wider point of view allows for much more complex storytelling and world exploration, two things that are especially important in the previously mentioned genres.
Third person is usually harder to write, especially with newer writers. You can very easily lose the plot, mainly by spending too much time describing a singular location.
Now that we have everything out there, which one is better?
I honestly don’t believe that one is better than the other. Yeah I know, that’s a bit of a cop out.
After going through everything I must say, I honestly don’t think that I can say that I like one more. Sure, while I may prefer to write in third-person, I’m constantly using first-person techniques.
I think that it depends mainly on the genre. Romance works really well with first-person so it makes sense why a romance-focused reader may like first-person more. The same goes with third-person and fantasy.
Even with that, there are genres that work well with both. Let’s look at horror. Two of the most popular horror novels are “The Shining” by Stephen King and “Dracula” by Bram Stoker. “The Shining” uses an omniscient third-person narrator for its story. Meanwhile, “Dracula” is told through old journal entries, making it first-person.
The world of literature is an extremely complex place. I understand why a person would want to stick exclusively with one genre or POV. However, I believe that it would be beneficial for a person to read outside their comfort zone every once in a while. After all, you’ll never know what you might like. Perhaps you may even have a new favorite way of reading.