A dramatic visual representation of me thinking about this post. Not really.
The thing is, I want to cut most of it out. It doesn’t need to be alternate history, nor necessarily sci-fi, because the story is about one and a half people, not about the goofy results of a different timeline or otherwordly gadgets (or gadgets that you and I have or have knowledge of, but with different nomenclature). It’s more of a thinky-doey conceptual story about what happens with a few people who try to figure a few things out, than a grand reordering of earth and technology. I want it to be more “hey, this person thought this and then did that, weird” than “crap, that fashion/gun/vehicle sounds weird and btw what is x like in this society?”
Should I shift from third person, with many parties, to first person or third person limited? Most of the novels that (I think) this would be like are small in scope, first person, or third person with strong limitations. The secondary parties that I do currently “jump” to are mainly for exposition, but there are other ways I can do info dumps with the limited POV, easily. I guess that’s why they’re secondary, but they are hardly necessary.
What say you, Internet?
* Working title, not the final one (probably).
Photo from crofesima.
4 Comments
What about omniscience, where you drop in and out of characters’ heads?
I sort of do that now…in the sense that I jump from different “groups” that are unrelated. Within the context of the scene, though, it’s 3rd person limited.
The omniscience thing is what I wanted to avoid. The meat (mmm) of the story is with two people. The jumping around is only for exposition, but I can do that in other ways.
Okay. I don’t think writers should have to limit themselves to 3rd person limited, but if that’s the way it works best, then carry on.
The story could be fully 3rd person omniscient, but it would be a different story than I wanted to tell, if that makes sense.