“Why didn’t you show up before me?”
_Highly recommended by Kim Ho-yeon, author of “Inconvenient Convenience Store”!

A steady seller in the writing category, written by the #1 Amazon bestselling author and editor.
The sequel to the best-selling "The Power of Description"!

Which author keeps the reader's attention until the very end?
How to Turn Your Writing into a Work of Art series

A clear and easy-to-understand guide to using point of view from Amazon's #1 bestselling novelist, Sandra Guss.
From subtle violations of point of view that even the writer may not be aware of to the secrets of dramatic tension and immersion that will hold the reader's attention until the very end, this book covers the basics of point of view and its practical application.

Point of view is a writer's most powerful tool for capturing the reader's subconscious.
If used properly, it can make the reader completely identify with the protagonist, or maintain suspense and tension until the last page with a carefully timed shift in perspective.
But what if the timing is wrong? The reader will simply close the book without knowing why.
Sandra Guss, a senior editor at a literary publishing house, says she sees instances of punctuation violations in the flood of submissions she receives every day, and advises that such manuscripts are unlikely to even be published.
Point of view is a tool that cannot be grasped properly and cannot be captured by the reader. However, if it is mastered, it can be used to surprise the reader and create admiration through excellent directing.
This book starts with the basics of perspective and systematically organizes techniques that can be applied immediately to the manuscript you are writing.

In her bestselling book, The Power of Description, the first book in her "How to Transform Your Writing into Art," Sandra Guss shows you what the ultimate practical guide to transforming your manuscript right now is.
This book is also structured to help you grasp the tool of perspective and apply it in real life, with concise and clear explanations and a plethora of examples.
What perspective should best be used in my work, my genre? When should I introduce a momentary shift in perspective that creates tension? How should I portray the narrator's facial expressions? If you've only considered the perspective of the story—whose eyes are you viewing the events through?—you'll be amazed at what perspective can do for your work.
Let's keep this book by our side and gradually revise the manuscript we're writing while learning point-of-view techniques through situational examples.
Even if it is the same story, the reader's sense of three-dimensionality and immersion will differ depending on who tells it and how.

As a senior editor, I read manuscripts sent to publishers by new writers and find instances of point-of-view violations on a daily basis.
Even experienced writers are no exception.
Our publishing house rejects most manuscripts like this.
Point of view has such a profound impact on every aspect of a novel that it takes too long to correct fundamental mistakes about it.
---From the "Preface"

The experience of reading a book feels much more intimate than other storytelling mediums like movies or TV dramas.
Because books have a point of view.
When reading a novel, whether short or long, the reader does not simply observe the outwardly visible activities and listen to the dialogue.
The reader delves deep into the character's mind, experiences events through the character's eyes, and shares the character's emotions.
Rather than simply watching the story unfold, you become the main character of the story and experience that life firsthand.
---From "Chapter 1: Definition and Importance of Point of View"

The reader might think, "What does it matter what the point of view is, since they won't know it anyway?"
However, the reader can sense the 'results' caused by the point of view problem.
Of course, in most cases, you wouldn't be able to pinpoint exactly why it's a problem with the perspective, but instead, you'd say you don't feel for the main character or find it difficult to immerse yourself in the story.
---From "Chapter 1: Definition and Importance of Point of View"

The key to first-person fiction is having characters who are interesting enough to hold the reader's attention from beginning to end.
Unless the speaker has a strong and engaging voice, the reader is forced to listen for hours to someone who speaks monotonously and boringly.
---From "Chapter 3 First-Person Point of View"

The third-person objective point of view is also called the 'cinematic point of view', the 'impersonal point of view', or the 'observer point of view'.
The narrator does not enter into the character's inner world, but exists outside of it, revealing only the facts that the camera can record.
At this point, the reader may feel like a fly on the wall.

Readers read not to gain information, but to experience emotions.
Readers read novels to experience the characters' emotions, thoughts, and motivations, not simply to observe them from the outside, as when watching a movie.
Therefore, a novel written with strict adherence to an objective point of view cannot satisfy this reader's needs throughout the book.
---From "Chapter 5 Third-Person Objective Point of View"

The most important thing to keep in mind here is that the omniscient narrator, like the first-person narrator, must speak in a strong, unique voice with its own personality.
The speaker's tone may be solemn or humorous, sarcastic or exclamation.
(...)

If we simply look into the heads of various characters without establishing such a strong narrator's voice, we are not writing a novel from an omniscient point of view, but rather 'head-hopping'.
Head-hopping refers to the clumsy use of the third-person limited point of view with multiple point of view characters.

Although it is rare today to write an entire novel from an omniscient point of view, some writers do use it at the beginning of a novel or chapter to give the reader a better understanding of the setting.
It involves writing a paragraph or a sentence or two at the beginning of a chapter from an omniscient point of view, then switching to a third-person limited point of view of a certain character, as if zooming in with a camera.
And the rest of the novel is written entirely in the third-person limited point of view.
If you use this method, it's a good idea to keep the establishing scene short and then quickly bring the reader into the mind of the point of view character.
---From "Chapter 6 Third-Person Omniscient Point of View"

Writing a novel in third-person multiple perspectives has several advantages. (...)
It can create tension and suspense.
In a mystery or thriller novel, the author can write a scene from the criminal's perspective and reveal to the reader the criminal's plan that the protagonist is unaware of.
For example, the film shows the criminal planting a bomb under the protagonist's car, then switches to the protagonist's point of view in the next scene or chapter and shows the protagonist getting into the car.
Romance novels can build suspense by showing scenes where the main characters develop prejudices against each other.
These prejudices will clash the moment the two people first meet.


Who stands to gain or lose the most in this scene? In most cases, each scene should be told through the eyes of the character with the most to lose.
---From "Chapter 9 Third-Person Multiple Points of View"

You can begin your story with a narrative distance, such as a wide-angle shot of the entire town at the beginning of a novel or chapter.
Then move the camera closer and finally get close to the person as if you were taking a close-up shot.
You can take a step back to shift the focus of the story and then dive in again to something else.

This does not mean that you can jump around narratively from stage to stage as you please.
Perhaps throughout the novel, the narrative distance will be maintained at the three or four levels described above.
If you change narrative distance too frequently or too hastily, your readers will become confused.
Therefore, when changing narrative distance, you must be careful to change it step by step.
For example, you should not suddenly jump from step 1 to step 3.

A tall woman ran through the forest.
She stumbled as her shirt caught on a branch.
What the hell.

The narrative distance of the first sentence is very far, but the next sentence goes straight into the character's inner world.
If you skip straight from step 1 to step 4 like this, the reader will be irritated and won't be able to immerse themselves in the story.
---From "Chapter 11 Narrative Distance"

Head-hopping simply means changing perspectives mid-scene.
It's about suddenly pulling the reader out of one character's mind and then putting them into another character's mind without any warning.
As a result, readers may feel confused and unsure of whose perspective they are on.
Every time a head-scratcher occurs, the immersion in the story is broken, and if this mistake continues, the reader will just put the book down.
---From "Chapter 13: The Trap of Head-Switching"

Just as with first-person point of view, there is absolutely no need to enclose internal monologue in quotation marks or otherwise delineate it when writing in third-person point of view.
There is no need to attach a thought label.
At this point, the author has entered deep into the character's mind, so the reader already knows that what he is reading is the character's thoughts.

At this point, even in your inner monologue, you should maintain the third person and past tense.
Changing to the first-person present tense creates a sense of distance between the speaker and the thinking subject, giving the reader the impression that they are not the same person.
This is not desirable in a deep perspective novel.

---From "Chapter 15: Inner Monologue"