#249. 5 POV Mistakes That Pull Readers Out of Your Story
episode
Fiction Writing Made Easy with Savannah Gilbo | How to Write a Novel & Writing Advice
32 min
1 speaker
2 chapters
transcribed 1 month ago
Transcript
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Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
What is the overall problem with point‑of‑view that makes scenes feel off?
Writing a novel can feel frustrating when you keep getting stuck in the same patterns, whether that's struggling to find time, rewriting the same chapters, or getting overwhelmed by too much advice. To help you out, I created a free guide called Five Writing Roadblocks Keeping You Stuck and How to Break Through. This guide will help you identify what's really slowing you down and find a clearer path forward. You can grab that for free at savannagilbo.com forward. Slash roadblocks. One more time, that's savanna gilbo.com forward slash roadblocks. We will also put that link for you in the show notes. Now let's get into the episode. After every important action or observation, I want you to ask yourself, what does this mean to my point of view character right now in the moment?
So not in general, not eventually, right now, in this moment, given what they know, given what they want, given what they're trying to do, what does this mean to my point of view character right now? And then write the line in your draft that answers that question. Welcome to the Fiction Writing Made Easy podcast. My name is Savannah Gilbo and I'm here to help you write a story that works. I want to prove to you that writing a novel doesn't have to be overwhelming. So each week I'll bring you a brand new episode with simple, actionable, and step-by-step strategies that you can implement in your writing right away. So whether you're brand new to writing or more of a seasoned author looking to improve your craft, this podcast is for you.
So pick up a pen and let's get started. In today's episode, we're talking about point of view, specifically the five most common point of view mistakes I see writers make. And here's the thing about point of view: it's one of the trickiest layers of fiction to get right because it controls how the reader is going to experience your story. It determines whose head we're in, what they have access to, what they're allowed to know, and how close they feel to your character on the page. And so if you've ever had the experience, Experience of reading back through one of your scenes and you've had the thought that something here isn't quite working, but you can't figure out what it is, then point of view is one of the first places I recommend you look.
Especially if the scene has the right events, but still feels confusing, distant, flat, or emotionally disconnected. And so in this episode, I'm gonna walk you through the five most common mistakes I see in regards to point of view. view, I'm going to share what each mistake looks like on the page, why it pulls readers out of your story, and what to do instead. But before we dive into that, if you haven't already decided on the point of view that you're going to write your story in, or if you want a little bit of a primer on point of view, I want you to go back and listen to episode number 90 where I walk you through how to choose the best point of view for your story. That episode will give you the foundation and this one will help you troubleshoot what's actually happening in your manuscript.
All right, so one more time, that's episode number 90, and you'll learn how to choose the best point of view for your story. I will link to that in the show notes for easy access as well. Alright, now let's dive right into the five mistakes, starting with mistake number one, which is head hopping. And this is probably the most common point of view mistake I see, and it's also the one writers are usually most surprised to find out that they're making. Now, just to make sure we're on the same page, head hopping happens when you start a single scene in one character's perspective, and then without a scene or a chapter break, you slip into another character. character's thoughts, feelings, or internal experience.
So let me give you an example of what I mean. Let's say that we're in a scene and we're in Sarah's point of view and she's having a really tense conversation with a character named Mark. So the scene is building nicely because we're having this tense conversation.
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Chapters
2 chaptersSpeakers
1 identifiedMore from Fiction Writing Made Easy with Savannah Gilbo | How to Write a Novel & Writing Advice
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