Changing POV Like You Change Underwear

Hopefully most writers change their underwear more often than they change POV in their story. A recent inquiry asked whether changing from 1st person POV (the dreaded "I" voice in the publishing world--lots of agents/editors don't like it) to 3rd person POV (the "he/she walked and talked" voice that everyone loves) was acceptable.

Can't say that I recommend it, because it TENDS to jar the reader out of the story, but there's no rule saying you can't do it. Like all writing do's and dont's in the publishing arena, you have to choose which ones work for you, which ones don't. I wouldn't even call them rules, but hints as to tactics a lot of writers tried to pull off but didn't, so agents and editors came to discuss the tactics as no-no's.

To be fair, I recently read a book called "Infamous" by Suzanne Brockmann that changed POV from the start from 3rd to 1st and back again. The 1st person POV was a ghost, the great-grandfather and assumed outlaw of the hero. So the story was basically told from his point of view overall. Though jarring at first, I got used to it (though it's still not my preference). In the end, the quality of the story helped me overlook the POV and other writing issues (more editing, please, for less dragging scenes).

If your story is absolutely made BETTER by switching POV's then by all means go for it. The point is to be thoughtful of why others have not pulled this trick off, why they've made a bad name for it--then avoid their mistakes.

Good luck, Angels.
Your Editor Devil

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