Posting on the fly here--workshop still going on.

But recently Cat Rambo read my book Inda and asked me
>for a mini-interview on omni POV. A subject I am always intensely interested in discussing.

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What does Ada Palmer's recent science fictional novel Too Like the Lightning share with Maria Edgeworth's Castle Rackrent and Denis Diderot's and Laurence Sterne's and Henry Fielding's works? The seduction of a wonderful narrative voice.

When Pat Rice talks about ridding her stories of the last vestiges of the old omni voice (which Georgette Heyer* stayed with, though the twentieth century literary scene was fast dumping the narrative fashions of the preceding century), I started thinking about how much I really like omni ( Read more... )

Narrators, reliable and un.

I didn't actually intend to relate them, but I was asked to write a riff about Megan Whalen Turner, who does some nifty stuff with her narrators, so I'm linking it here.

Discussion welcome at any of these places, and that includes suggestions of books that do cool things with narrators and narration.

David Jauss says about POV:

The effective author uses Point of View to control the distance between the reader and the characters to maximize the response the author desires--whether that be moral, intellectual, or emotional.

and

Within Point of View the author employs various angles of perception, utilizing degrees of depth within each angle ( Read more... )

My reading has been extremely sporadic. I hope to get to some titles of things I really liked later, but my timer today is just about out ( Read more... )

I have this idea that at least as important as conflict and character and setting there must also be Voice. That means, the writer really ought to know who the narrator is. And yes, this means tight third. The assumption that tight third means there is no narrator--just a neutral writer-down of text--smashes many stories flat ( Read more... )

I have seven trumpet lily blooms out there, two glorious, five coming along slowly. So I should have several weeks of those beautiful flowers.

Reread Mrs Gaskell’s Wives and Daughters.
( Read more... )

I realized from an early age that rereading meant the book would change. One knew what would happen, so the surprise was gone, but if one could anticipate favorite scenes, savoring set in ( Read more... )

One of my correspondents (referred hereafter as C) going back to the Genie days has been putting all their formidably analytical skills into picking apart books, from classics to best sellers, to determine what works and what doesn’t ( Read more... )