5 Tips To Show Time Passing In Deep Point Of View

August 25, 2023 by Lisa Hall-Wilson 1 Comment

Man holding newspaper checking his watch. Text reads: SHOW the passage of time without breaking deep point of view.

I was mining through the comments section on the blog, and this one came up a couple of times: how do you show the passage of time in a story without using author intrusion or telling? This is a tricky one that trips up a lot of writers trying to learn deep point of view.

For writers who grew up reading more distant point of views, it feels natural to have the author voice step in and explain or summarize that time has passed. There’s no author voice in deep point of view.

If the goal is to keep the story in deep pov, CONTEXT, DIALOGUE, AND SETTING are the tools we have to show time has passed. Some key red-flag words to watch for are: when, afterwards, and then, next, until, following, earlier…

When Sally got home… (Telling. Would Sally say this to herself? Probably not – it’s the author jumping in to summarize time passing. Just show Sally arriving home)

Sheila went shopping and afterwards watched a movie. (This is telling. SHOW Sheila shopping and then watching a moving. If either is relevant to the story, explore that scene with readers. If these lines are not moving the story ahead, they’re simply telling the reader time has passed — just pick up where the story begins again and show the time passed with context.)

Sheila woke up the next morning… (Telling. Deep POV is the character living out the story in real time with the reader. Would she narrate her own actions? Every word on the page comes from the pov character. Every. Word. Just show Sheila waking up.)

woman in a thinking pose with the text: What is emotional context?

Using Setting To Show The Passage Of Time

This can be something as simple as noticing the time on a clock, noting the sun has moved in the sky, or a change of seasons.

Sarah shivered and rubbed at the raised bumps on her arms. She looked for the sun. It had already descended behind the trees heading for the horizon.

How can the pov character interact with the setting or the characters around them in such a way that it’s clear to the reader that time has passed? Do they pick up a stack of mail from the front door? Pick up Fluffy from the cat hotel? Are weeds and grass growing wild where they should be kept neat and trimmed? Is paint peeling, shingles missing from the roof, porches leaning with railings fallen over? Does Dad have a few more wrinkles or more gray hair than last time? Has their inbox exploded because no one’s done their job while they were away.

Make a list of what’s changed or what stands out, and then choose one or two key descriptions to show the passage of time.

Using Context To Show Time Passing

This requires some forethought (or editing after the fact), but building into the story cues on the passage of time is effective as well. Does the character habitually do anything on a particular day or hour? Having the character do these things cues the reader into time and place. Think about your character’s daily routine and how they move through their day.

Daily routine ideas:

Do they grocery shop every Tuesday? Or maybe they only grocery shop after 11pm when it’s quieter in the shops.
A cup of tea before bed
Do they read the paper with breakfast every morning?
Is there 5 o’clock rush hour traffic?
Are the shadows longer or shorter?
Is it hotter or cooler than earlier?
Meals are a great hint to readers about the passage of time. Sitting down to breakfast or dinner immediately roots the reader in time of day.

A Ticking Clock

Maybe you’ve built in a ticking clock into your plot. The character makes note of the time specifically because it’s limited and carries significant consequence. Similar to this, is there an event the character is anticipating — a vacation, time off, road trip, parent-teacher interviews, peach season — whatever. By noting this event earlier, when it arrives the reader intuits how much time has gone by.

Stan’s watch chirped, and then buzzed with an alarm. His shoulders slumped. He was late picking up Sarah from school again.

Steve’s hands ached from gripping the steering wheel and slammed on the brakes – again. The car in front of him edged out of the parking lot, the driver lifting a hand in thanks as though Steve had invited being cut off. There must’ve been a hockey game on downtown. He checked his watch. 10pm. About time for that.

Use Dialogue To Note Passage Of Time

Have other characters note the passage of time. Let them ask a question, or perform some other action that tips the reader off about a change in time. This is perhaps the easiest workaround when it works for your story.

“How was your vacation, Stan? Two weeks in the sun must’ve been amazing.”

The barista set the coffee cup on the counter and rang up Mark’s purchase. “Haven’t seen you here for a couple of weeks.”

“The plane leaves in two hours, and we haven’t even left for the airport yet!” (Then show them running to their gate.)

One Quick Tip About Deep Point Of View

One quick tip that’s pretty vital, is to make sure the character has a natural/organic reason to notice the passage of time. This reduces the tendency to have the author voice step in with that information. What cues the character to check a watch or the calendar? What’s going on that’s causing them to note the day or time? What are they anticipating?

With the examples above (with the exception of the dialogue examples), each character has a reason to note the time. There’s some sort of external cue, a line of thinking that leads them to note the time.

Steve smelled the milk in the fridge. He jerked his head away from the sour odor. “How long has it been since we’ve been grocery shopping?”

Sheila’s stomach rumbled again. She checked her watch. She’d missed lunch again.

Telling Isn’t Always Bad

Here’s the honest truth I don’t find too many blogs on deep point of view admitting. Sometimes, you have to use telling to keep the story moving.

Sometimes the verbal and mental gymnastics required to stay in deep point of view will simply bog down the story to such a degree that it’s either tedious or ridiculous. I remember writing a scene a while ago where I needed a POV character to be present so the reader could hear what was going on, but it made no sense for this character to be there. I had them hiding in a bush listening in on a conversation. It got silly.

So, if the reader just needs to know we’re five years in the future, or a date or place, sometimes it’s really just better to cheat deep point of view for a moment and deliver that information quickly and concisely and keep the story moving. Brief headings at the beginning of a chapter work well and aren’t intrusive to readers generally (when used sparingly). Ie.

500BCE Near The Black Sea,

Five Years Later

It’s definitely more work to stay in deep pov and show a passage of time, but the reward is keeping the reader rooted in time and place without interrupting the story with the author voice. Got a good example of showing the passage of time? Share it below to help others brainstorm!

How To Revise For Deep POV

January 1, 2023 by Lisa Hall-Wilson 3 Comments

So, you’ve decided (or been told) to revise or rewrite your manuscript into deep POV. Congrats!! Once you go deep, you never go back! But WOW!! Every writer facing this decision is justifiably intimidated by the mountain of work you now seem to be facing. You’re not alone! I was asked in my free Facebook group to break down the process behind rewriting or revising for deep POV.

How Deep Do You Want To Go: Genre Conventions?

This is the first fundamental question you must ask yourself. What genre are you writing? You need to know the genre (assuming your goal is to sell your work in stores or online) because you need to know what shelf your book will go on. Readers will have certain expectations depending on genre.

Of course you’ll find books that break the rule, but generally speaking if you’re writing any kind of romance genre, women’s lit, YA and NA, you’re going to be using Deep POV exclusively, or very heavily. If you’re writing any fantasy genre or thrillers you’re going to use deep POV a lot, but by necessity employ the narrator/writer voice. Other genres can go very deep or not use deep POV at all. I’m thinking of literary genres, historicals, mystery/suspense, horror, memoirs, creative non-fiction. (Just off the top of my head.) These last genres can use deep POV for emotional gut punches, would be well-served by deep POV exclusively, but it’s not genre convention to do either.

So once you have genre conventions settled, you must decide how deep you want to go – personal preference. Because here’s the honest truth, it’s hard and it’s going to ask a lot of you as a writer. Going deep requires you to explore emotions with your character that you might not be comfortable exploring in real life which will make this work very very difficult. It will be worth it, but it will be hard. Be kind to yourself, learn when to walk away and clear the emotions the writing has unearthed, unplug, etc.

How Deep Do You Want To Go: Author Voice?

I asked students of my four week masterclass this: After taking the four week masterclass, how into deep POV are you on a scale of 10 – all in, every character all the time to 1 – like the idea but I don’t get it and it’s not for me.

Romance – 9/10

Sci-fi/fantasy: 9. Have to know when to pull out sometimes.

Thriller: About #6. I don’t think I’d want to write my thriller in any more or less than this.

Memoir: It’s 7-8 for me. My major issue is that writing memoir makes it a little harder, since memoir generally calls for 1st person, but it requires so much more examination in DPOV.

Historicals and fantasy: My goal is 10 – my skill is still about 7, I think, but getting stronger.

In order to make these decisions, these writers have had to learn about their genre, how deep POV best serves the story they want to tell, and their author voice (how they want to tell the story). Answer those questions first. In addition, you need to understand the basic tools of deep POV and the effects those tools aim to create. There’s more to deep POV than removing dialogue tags!

The point I want to make is there are no rules. YOU decide how deep you want to go and where you cheat, so the revision process is entirely dependent on those decisions. My best advice: be consistent, be strategic. If you’re going to use/cheat deep POV know why, know what effect you want to create and what emotion you’re trying to convey to readers. Have a plan.

Rewrite Or Revise?

This depends on how deep you want to go. If your goal is to add deep POV just for emotional gut punches in specific scenes or for specific plot points, revising those moments is all that’s necessary. If you have written in objective third person, limited third person, or used the narrator voice a lot in first person and want to switch to mostly deep POV, that’s a lot of rewriting.

What emotional tone are you going for? Is the emotional journey your character takes the major plot line? Then your story is going to be well-served by deep POV and becoming curious about what emotions are in play will add depth and emotional connection for readers.

All things being equal, make the decision that’s best for the story. You’ll be happier with the final product.

First Layer To Revise For Deep POV: Remove Narrative Distance

If you want to help the reader feel a bit more connected and immerse them deeper into the story world without a lot of major rewrites, these three things (the work needed to revise increases with each step) are where I would start. By employing the basic tools of deep POV, you can achieve a deep POV-esqe feel. I have a course here on the Foundations Of Deep POV.

Remove dialogue tags and make better use of beats. Removing the he/she said tags and use action beats is a good first step. The next step to challenge yourself is using complex beats over simple action beats. Find out more about that here.
Remove filter words to help the reader feel immersed in the story. Don’t tell the reader the character sees, hears, knows, learns, remembers, wants, feels, etc. Just show what the character is experiencing. There’s a lot of art to this, it’s not as simple as it sounds, but this is a good starting point.
Remove emotion words to remove some narrative distance. Don’t tell the reader the character is happy, sad, angry, betrayed, melancholy, etc. SHOW the reader how the character feels using sensory details, setting and description, actions and posture, tone of voice, etc. The key here is after you’ve removed the emotion words, remembering to add the emotion back into the story. The emotions are the glue that makes deep POV work and this is required if you want to go deep, but the deeper you go the more rewriting you’ll have to do. I have a whole course dedicated to writing emotions in layers you can check out here.

Second Layer To Revise For Deep POV: Remove Author/Narrator Voice

We’re wading into rewriting more than revising territory here. You need to learn to recognize the author or narrator voice first, learn how to remove it, and then learn how to give that information to the reader without inserting yourself into the story. If you’ve been writing for a while, the first two steps will come easier.

First Person and Limited Third Person all allow for the author/narrator voice to different extents. This narration/author voice is a big part of what’s eliminated by deep POV to immerse readers in the story world and emotional journey of the character. Read more about POV styles here.

This a HUGE topic and is one a lot of writers new to deep POV struggle with, so as a place to start, keep in mind that when writing exclusively in deep POV every word on the page comes to the reader through the point of view character. So, either the character hears, sees, learns, interprets, intuits, what’s going on around them and filters that information through their unique perspective (past experiences, prejudices, morals, priorities, etc) to the reader, or the reader is privy to the internal thoughts and sensations of the character directly (not through you the writer).

The writer/narrator voice is often used to explain, justify, describe, summarize, give backstory for what’s going on for readers as a sort of short-hand to keep the story moving. Once you remove this and deliver the same info to the reader entirely through the character’s perspective it can slow the pace, it can add layers of description that editors not familiar with deep POV will say is “on-the-nose” or unnecessary. This is why you need to know the tools and the effects the tools create, and then use them strategically. Without that purposed perspective, deep POV can slow the pace, add to your word count, meander, and leave readers frustrated with false anticipation.

Write thoughts (internal dialogue) as though the character is alone inside their own heads.

They don’t remind themselves of past relationships, or actively recall prior knowledge. We don’t usually choose to relive the most painful moments of our past, we avoid doing that so giving backstory requires thought and consistency.

Always keep the reader rooted in the POV character’s perspective.

Hoping I’ll share some examples? Make sure to join the free Facebook group Going Deeper With Emotions In Fiction where I do a live video of blog posts and share examples, further explain points in the post, and take questions.

Third Layer To Rewrite For Deep POV: Adding Emotional Surprise And The Why

Adding emotional surprise and exploring the WHY will absolutely take your writing the next level and you’ll never go back. Each scene will have its own emotional arc, and the high point can land at any point in the scene (beginning, middle or end), but building in surprise for the reader is crucial. I really enjoyed Donald Maass’ book Creating Emotional Craft Of Fiction for understanding this aspect of emotional surprise.

You must become curious about the emotional context and the emotional stakes for your character. What makes them speak up or keep quiet? What makes them take a risk or play it safe? What ELSE are they feeling? Too often, we write one-dimensional emotions and with deep POV you really need to dig deep and discover the emotional conflict in every decision that drives the story.

The WHY is the lynch pin to all of this. WHY does your character make the decisions they do? Why do they choose x over y? Exploring this adds depth, nuance, and subtext that grabs readers by the throat and won’t let them go.

Example Of Deep POV Revision

Original: Jason watched the woman walk towards the bar, her heels clicked on the hard linoleum. Looked too much like his ex-wife, and he was too smart to fall into that pit twice. He tipped his beer to his lips to calm the zing of attraction in his gut. Not worth it, he thought.

As you think back on the steps I’ve listed above, you can maybe see some obvious revisions that would be simple and easy to complete. Let’s look at those first layer revisions.

First Step Revision: The woman walked towards the bar, her three-inch heels clacked on the hard linoleum. Looked too much like his ex-wife, and he was too smart to fall into that pit twice. He tipped his beer to his lips. Not interested.

This accomplishes everything in step one — almost. Lots of writers believe this is deep POV. It’s a first step towards deep POV. I removed the tags (he thought) and the distance (watched) and the emotion words (attraction), but I didn’t add the emotion back in. What might this look like if we move to step two? We’re looking to do all of the above, but also remove the author/narrator voice now.

Second Step Revision: The woman walked towards the bar, her three-inch heels clacked on the hard linoleum. He tipped his beer to his lips. Not interested.

Do you see now where the author intrusion was? The line: Looked too much like his ex-wife, and he was too smart to fall into that pit twice is the author explaining why the character is making this choice, and. adds some backstory. Now, if the reason this character is making this decision isn’t important to the plot, this may be all that’s necessary.

But, let’s say why he makes this decision is the lead up to the emotional high point of this scene, what might that third layer of revision look like? What questions might we ask this character to become more curious about the emotions involved? Why isn’t he interested? What about his relationship with his ex is he wanting to avoid? What were the consequences of that past relationship he doesn’t want to repeat?

In moments that move the story ahead, leaving this emotional gap will get you feedback like: I didn’t get why they did x or this character makes no sense or I couldn’t connect with the character.

There’s no WHY.

Third Step Revision – Full Deep POV: Feminine heels clicked on the hard linoleum behind him. Jason swivelled in his seat. The lanky blond-from-a-box strode towards the bar, chest out, chin high. Her high-end heels and pricey suit too rich for this rundown hole. Her blouse peeked open with each flirty swing of her hips showing more cleavage than would be office-appropriate. He leaned in for a second look, heat spreading to all the right parts.

She glanced at him, her gaze flicking down to his boots and back up to the brim of his dusty hat. She gave a small eye-roll the way Sandy used to, and aimed two extra seats away. An old pain filled his chest, a horse-kick to the sternum. He wasn’t changing for no woman. He turned back to face the bar and tipped his beer to his lips. Not worth the trouble.

Do you see how deep POV is just MORE? More WHY. More emotions. More showing. This last step of adding in emotional curiosity/context and THE WHY adds more depth, but it also requires the reader to lean in and do their own work to understand what’s going on. That engagement is a feature of deep POV.

Without the explaining, justification, summarizing, of the author voice, it takes more work, more curiosity, more emotional context to give the reader the same info. So, you can decide that this stylistic choice doesn’t fit your story except in specific scenes and that’s fine. You can still use deep POV and land somewhere inbetween the original and this last revision. But maybe this last revision is the direction you want to take your writing.

Choosing An Editor For Deep POV

As you can see for yourself, deep POV uses tools that other POV styles will avoid. If you’re wanting to write in deep POV, aim to find an editor familiar with deep POV and your genre. An editor unfamiliar with, or who doesn’t like, deep POV will flag much of that last revision as unnecessary. For editors more familiar with limited third person especially, deep POV appears to drag down the pace, will feel like navel gazing or on-the-nose. (I would argue none of those things are wrong if you’re using them sparingly and strategically, but that’s another blog post.)

I have critique partners who are experienced with deep POV, who can point out where I could go deeper or where deep POV doesn’t serve the story in places (where the author voice/explanation is most expedient for instance). It’s less about being in deep POV ALL the time than it is about learning the tools and using them strategically in the way that best serves your story and your voice.

How into deep POV are you (or do you want to be) on a scale of 10 – all in, every character all the time to 1 – like the idea but I don’t get it and it’s not for me?

When To Use Deep POV In Fiction By Genre

December 13, 2022 by Lisa Hall-Wilson 9 Comments

Deep POV is a popular stylistic writing technique that aims to remove the narrative/psychic distance between readers and the POV character. Deep POV’s goal is to immerse the reader in a real-time, lived-experience of the character’s emotional journey. The reader experiences the story as the character lives it out giving the reader has a front-row seat in the character’s brain. Obviously, I’m a big fan of deep POV, but realistically it’s not the best choice for EVERY story, nor is it a style choice that every writer needs to adopt. So, what is deep POV really good at, and where might this style of writing not serve story? Let’s dig deeper!

Genres Best-Suited To Using Deep POV For The Whole Book

Some genres are better suited to using deep POV exclusively, throughout the whole book. Not every writer chooses to write only in deep POV, and those points are next, but let’s look at the genres best suited to exclusively using deep POV.

Romance genres, literary genres, fantasy and fantasy sub-genres, YA, NA, all come to mind. Thrillers are often well-served by deep POV, horror maybe less-so, but it depends on the story. Basically, plots that focus on the character’s internal journey make the best use of deep POV’s focus on the character’s emotional journey.

If you’re looking for an emotional gut punch (happy, fearful, or sad), deep POV creates powerful emotional connections with readers. Stories that spend a lot of time, or focus, on internal conflict and/or emotional growth will be well-served by the built-in self awareness and introspection deep POV does really well.

For those suspense and mystery writers who may say you can’t use deep POV exclusively — I disagree. It’s more challenging to write those genres using deep POV because deep POV doesn’t allow for keeping secrets from the reader (that are known to the POV character). If keeping secrets from readers is a plot device you’re married to, using deep POV exclusively isn’t a great fit. Readers WILL feel cheated by this. However, a suspense or mystery where the POV character discovers and learns information and is surprised along with the reader could use deep POV to great effect.

I am personally a big fan of the Nordic Noir genre even though I find the secret-keeping hugely annoying lol Someone point me to a great Nordic Noir story that uses deep POV – PLEASE!! (maybe I just need to write one :D)

Where To Use Deep Point Inside Other POV Styles

There are still plenty of writers using first person and limited third person POV who make great use of the emotional gut punch offered by deep POV on a scene-by-scene basis.

Pulling Readers Into High Emotion: What’s the emotional high-point of the scene you’re working on? Do you know what emotion you want the reader to understand the character is experiencing (or even better what blend of emotions)? Deep POV used strategically can really pull the reader in close for a moment or a chapter inside a story written in first person or limited third person to really give an emotional gut punch. *Avoid the pitfall of trying to evoke a particular emotion in the reader.*

Mirror Moments: James Scott Bell’s book Writing From The Middle talks about mirror moments, the exact middle of a story where a character takes stock of who they are, what they want, what they’ve lost/sacrificed, and what has to change in order for them to achieve their story goal. These moments of introspection and high emotion where the character is focused on how they FEEL are well served by deep POV.

Surprising Readers: If you’ve read anything by Donald Maass, he spends a lot of time talking about the importance of surprising readers, especially with emotions. Deep POV really does well at internal conflict, that push-pull of more than one emotion, which also is great for building in reader surprise. It’s very common in real life to find our emotions pull us in more than one direction. Going out with friends is great, but knowing your ex will likely be there creates internal conflict (more than one emotion wants to be a primary concern). This push-pull of conflicting emotions is where you can dig deep for the emotions in the POV character and create surprise.

Deep POV slows the story with the introspection and description, so works really well to create suspense or anticipation for readers.

I love this scene from Guilty Pleasures by Laurel Hamilton. Anita (a necromancer) finds herself at a vampire strip club, but her goal for the evening (this scene) was not to be swayed (entranced, hypnotized, etc) by a vampire, which she admits to herself won’t be easy to do. And yet, she’s momentarily swayed even with her guard up just for a split second. Look at Anita’s momentary reaction “…it felt good.” The dip into deep POV here from the first person narrative pulls readers in, just as Anita was pulled in. For just a moment, she’s just as vulnerable as everyone else in the room despite her prior knowledge, preparation, and vigilance.

“Jean-Claude was suddenly beside me, and I hadn’t seen him come. “Are you all right, Anita?”

His voice held things that the words didn’t even hint at. Promises whispered in darkened rooms, under cool sheets. He sucked me under, rolled my mind like a wino after money, and it felt good. Crash–Shrill–Noise thundered through my mind, chased the vampire out, held him at bay.

My beeper had gone off. I blinked and staggered against the table.”

Guilty Pleasures, Laurell K. Hamilton

Playing With Time and Out Of Body Moments: Deep POV is really useful for creating the effect of time slowing or speeding past. Those moments where an hour has gone by unnoticed, or the watched-pot-never-boils feeling. Going deep can provide an opportunity for reflection in an inbetween moment in the plot, or show strong emotion that’s overwhelming or someone in denial.

Deep POV is also effective when you’re trying to show coping mechanisms, like the mom who deep cleans the oven at 10pm because her husband is “working late” again. Her deep clean is a distraction from where her mind wants to dwell. What if no matter how hard she scrubs, her mind won’t stop circling the obvious suspicions? What if she starts crying and tries to deny how she feels by simply scrubbing harder? Lots to play with here and deep POV works really well for this.

What Deep POV Is Not Well-Suited For…

Deep POV does have its weaknesses. The level of showing in the storytelling requires the reader to do work and lean into the story because the writer doesn’t do the thinking for them (through/by telling). Not everyone wants to write that type of story, nor is every genre best served by this stylistic choice.

High Action Stories: Deep POV has the tendency to slow the pace of a story and so for stories that are more action than introspection, deep POV slows things too much. It’s isn’t that you can’t write a fast-paced story using deep POV, it’s that stories that use a lot of high-action sequences (car-chase type fast-paced) where things have to happen boom boom boom without pause, deep POV will work against that effect. In stories like this, deep POV is often best used on a sentence by sentence level, not even on a scene level. Just that quick but deep gut-check before the character has to launch into action again works well.

Static Characters And/Or External Obstacles: Stories that make use of static characters, or characters who are not self-reflective much at all, deep POV doesn’t work well for. Lee Child’s Jack Reacher novels, for instance, don’t use deep POV at all (or much at all). I have never asked Lee Child why, (and I’ve only read three so far) but my guess is that Reacher isn’t super in touch with his emotions. His story goals involve more external obstacles, rather than internal conflict. He generally has all the skills/emotional tools he needs to achieve the story goal, so that’s not where the character arc happens.

Westerns, Nordic Noir, Procedurals: These genres usually don’t use deep POV because, IMHO, those characters don’t seem to prioritize emotional health or emotions in general. They’re far more likely to drown troubling emotions in alcohol or bar fights (I’m sure there are exceptions). Troubled protagonists who use isolation, addiction, or other problematic coping mechanisms to deny or suppress emotions they don’t know what to do with, tend to avoid self-reflection or allowing emotions to rule them with bare exceptions for mirror moments. Not to say those genres couldn’t use deep POV, but in general they don’t seem to.

Kids Lit and MG: Stories for younger readers aren’t served well by deep POV generally because those readers aren’t experienced enough to intuitively understand the stories through subtext (showing). These stories in general rely on telling quite a bit, so deep POV isn’t usually a great fit. I’ve had students learning deep POV who write MG, so it can work, but there’s a lot of bending of the rules.

Historicals: Fantasy and historicals often cheat deep POV here and there because they’re forced to define, explain or describe foreign terms. But beyond that, historicals in general don’t tend to use deep POV except for select moments. Partly because those readers are seeking the additional sweeping descriptions and explanations of things the character wouldn’t need to remind themselves of which is a big aspect of deep POV.

Historicals that fall under a romance sub-genre or a fantasy sub-genre are a bit different because the romance (internal feelings) or quest (internal conflict) aspects are the priority rather than the straight history.

Is Deep POV A Good Fit For Your Story?

Are you trying to decide if deep POV would serve your story well? My first bit of advice is to go look at the bestsellers in your genre. Are they using deep POV throughout the whole novel, saving it for key moments, are not at all? Some genres have an expectation of deep POV, and other genres are more flexible and let you choose.

Do you read stories written entirely in deep POV? Deep POV is commonly used by many writers, even if just for key moments, so are you able to recognize the change in the stories you read?

Why Deep POV Isn’t Working And How To Fix It

August 22, 2022 by Lisa Hall-Wilson 5 Comments

Many blogs repeat the same four to six points on writing in deep POV, so you read those and think – heh, that doesn’t look too hard. But your efforts continually fall short with beta readers, critique partners and editors. They say ‘go deeper’ and you scratch your head – but you DID go deeper. Let’s dive into the most common reasons deep POV isn’t working for newer writers and look at some solutions.

**This post got super long, so I’ve split it into parts.**

Point Of View Problems

You need a clear understanding of point of view for deep POV to work. This is not a beginner-friendly style to write in, so *deep breath* don’t give up.

Third person POV is a story from the he/she, they/them perspective. There are different ways to use third person POV. First person POV is the I, me, we, us perspective and there are different ways to use first person POV. Neither first person nor third person (or any version of either) is deep POV. You can learn more about first person POV here, and learn more about third person POV here.

· First Person POV heavily leans on the narrator/author voice when telling a story from a single character’s perspective. The POV narrator/character may or may not be the protagonist (so they may or may not be privy to the protagonist’s thoughts and feelings), the narrator could also be omniscient and outside the story itself.

· Limited Third Person POV uses the author voice (no narrators) to tell a story about a single character at a time. The author is only privy to the thoughts and emotions of a single character at a time, and that character may express thoughts directly to the reader (often differentiated from the author voice with italics).

· Deep POV isn’t strictly a point of view issue, the name is a little confusing. It’s an additional layer of point of view applied to either first person or third person POV. In deep POV there’s no author/narrator voice.

Let’s look at some examples:

First Person POV: I stretched out my legs under the table as Sally peeled the label off the empty wine bottle. She would never look at me when there was tension between us. From down the street, Macy’s apartment building loomed over the café. The words froze in my gut. How did I tell Sally I didn’t love her anymore?

Limited Third Person POV: Sally peeled the label off the empty wine bottle. She wouldn’t even look at him. George tucked his feet under his chair and drummed his fingers on the table, frustration making him twitchy. He stared off down the street at the apartment building where Macy lived, his gut twisting with the words he couldn’t quite get out. He didn’t love Sally anymore.

Deep POV: Sally sat, shoulders rounded like a turtle in its shell, peeling the label on the empty wine bottle. George tucked his heels under his chair and let his gaze wander down the street to Macy’s building. The modern glass structure loomed over the frozen-in-time café Sally preferred. He sucked in a deep breath, his gut clenching, his throat tight. “Sally, I don’t love you anymore.” The words erupted out.

The elimination of the author/narrator voice in deep POV requires you to give the reader two plus two and let them add it up to four. This means your description and observation skills must be on point, otherwise the reader won’t ‘get it’ and feel lost.

Head Hopping Problems

Adjacent to the issue with understanding how POV works, there are often head hopping issues. While there are first person and third person styles that use the omniscient viewpoint, it’s not all that common in popular fiction (sorry to all the diehard fans of Austen, Dickens, and Tolkien).

In contemporary popular fiction, the reader is only privy to what the POV character knows, intuits, learns, etc.

POV Violation: Cassandra kept her claws rounded and painted, her antennae erect and shiny. The green-skinned passersby approved of her with a nod and then dismissed the messy Steve who followed her.

Cassandra can’t know what others think of her or anyone else. This is an example of the author telling the reader the answer is four, instead of just giving the reader two plus two and letting them lean in and figure it out.

Deep POV: Cassandra examined the precisely-filed ends of her claws. A green-skinned man approached her, and his eyes widened and his antennae arched away from her. She checked her antennae, but they were perfect. She spun. Steve slumped along behind her, his left antennae bent and limp. Sickly splotches of purple marred his green skin.

See the difference?

This is the most-watched unit of my popular 5 week masterclass on writing in deep point of view. This is a deep dive into writing emotions in layers that assumes you already know the basics of this advanced writing style.

No Emotions Are Added

One of the most prevalent pieces of advice I’ve seen about deep POV is to remove emotion words. This relates back directly to give the reader two plus two, don’t tell them the answer is four. Newer writers learn to remove the emotion words, but don’t know how to add that emotion back in via showing and not using the author/narrator voice.

Sally anxiously waved at Mark from across the room.

Anxiously is an emotion word, so we know that’s the author voice creeping in.

Sally waved at Mark from across the room, wanting him to respond.

This is a common fix, but ‘wanting’ is still the author voice creeping in. It’s insidious, it’ll sneak in everywhere you’re unsure of what to say.

Sally rose up on her toes, heat crept into her cheeks. He finally looked at her and she lifted her hand to wave. What if he’s not looking at her? She sank back onto her heels and hid her hand behind her back, cutting the wave short.

With this last example, I’ve given the reader two plus two. Hopefully, reading that, you can figure out that she’s anxious, but in addition to that, when deep POV is done well, the WHY behind the emotion is shared as well. Why is Sally anxious? Because she doesn’t know if Mark even sees her.

Stay tuned for part two next week. What’s your biggest struggle with deep POV?

Go Deeper Writing Fiction With Personification

August 15, 2022 by Lisa Hall-Wilson Leave a Comment

I’m often asked HOW to go deeper in fiction. Even if you’re not writing in deep POV, there are always places in many scenes where you’re looking to show insight/motivation/desire, use subtext, create setting – in a deeper way. You’re setting or characters come alive on the page. Personification is one of those tools that every writer can use more effectively.

Personification is giving human-like qualities to non-human things.

The last piece of pie called his name.

The story jumped off the page.

Opportunity knocks.

Pie doesn’t talk. Stories can’t jump anymore than opportunity can knock on something. These are figurative meanings, but there’s a lot of variety and uses for personification and is a great way to be economical with your writing.

Personification can be used in a variety of ways: anthropomorphism (a non-human animal, object or deity literally acting like a human), pathetic fallacy (attributing human feelings to the natural world), embodiment (a person or thing is representative of an abstract concept – she is integrity itself), etc.

Personification is efficient – it can create both setting and mood for instance. A simple phrase can carry a lot of weight with readers and create mental pictures.

Use Personification For Setting

The environments we find ourselves in can be varied and particular, but by infusing those everyday things with emotions or human qualities, we add emotional depth to our writing. You can avoid the dreaded lists of description by using personification to show how your character is feeling, what they think/feel about the place they’re in or what they’re about to face. Show what the character is focused on or prioritizing.

I live in Canada and we have many descriptors for snow: whiteout, blizzard, flurry, squall, powder, slush, packing, frost, flake… Each descriptor dials in on intensity, impact/disruption, potential for damage, etc. Snow can cover the land in a crisp clean blanket, trace every branch with glittering frost, or cause multi-car pileups and kill with hypothermia. Now imbue some emotion or human qualities into those pictures.

The snow danced in the air, melting on my skin like a soft cool kiss.

The snow pelted my face, a thousand tiny needles freezing my face on impact.

Personification gives the setting mood, tone, and intent. How your character perceives the world around them, is it for them or against them, can show the reader the character’s mood, priorities, expectations, etc.

A man running through the woods for his life could perceive that the trees hide and shelter him. Or, he could interpret that the branches pull and tear at his clothes and skin, slowing him down. Be intentional and strategic with your word choices.

Personification Provides Immersive Sensory Details

Neil Gaiman writes, “Personification is an effective tool for placing the reader in the story with a 360° view of the setting. In Bleak House, Charles Dickens describes a thick fog settling as rolling, hovering, creeping, and ‘cruelly pinching’ the toes and fingers of a boy.” (source here)

A warrior waits on the brink of a battle. How do they feel about what’s to happen? About why they’re there? How do previous battle experiences influence their priorities, goals, motivations, and fears? You could use backstory, you could use a flashback, or you could use personification.

Zerynthia bounced on her toes and cracked her neck. Sucked in a long breath and exhaled. The leaves waved their encouragement and the sun pushed away the rain clouds and chased off the lingering shadows.

Can you picture her on the edge of battle, ready but nervous, and the trees with their waving fluttering leaves? The sun could stand in for some deity’s support perhaps. How does she feel about being there, about how her chances in the battle?

Personification Uses Subtext And Connotation

Subtext is what’s going on beyond what’s been said – it’s black-belt writing level. Use personification to show how a character feels, create a specific mood. Use connotation, the baggage that comes with a word beyond it’s surface meaning to evoke imagery and/or emotion.

If a character is in a forced labour camp, that invokes a particular kind of image. If the character is in a concentration camp, the connotation of that sends us back to 1940s Nazi Germany, even though technically a concentration camp was often a forced labour camp. See how connotation works?

Your character walks up to a house. How you describe that walk, the house, the weather, all of it creates this immersive effect for readers.

The house might loom, glare, impose its shadow, stand immovable against time, or keep secrets. Is the house cheerful or tired? Maybe the house has a veneer, a false façade? Does the character trudge, skip, drag their heels?

Using connotation, each of those descriptions add additional meaning on top of the personified meaning. The house that looms lends the impression of dread, vulnerability, inadequacy, shame, etc. That same house could stretch up to the sky stalwart against the effects of time. To a character who hates change, that might mean something comforting. To a character fighting tradition, this upcoming scene would feel like an inevitable failure is about to happen.

If the tired house leans over the broken walk, do you need to describe every broken shutter or missing shingle for the reader to understand how the how the house looks, or how the character perceives it? What’s fun is to then juxtapose the POV character’s perception of something against another character’s. The tired house with the broken walk might evoke hopelessness or dismissal from the POV character, but to another character that house offers opportunity, restoration, excitement.

Personification Easily Falls Into Cliché

Be vigilant to avoid cliché unless you’re using it intentionally to add meaning. Always build in surprise for readers. Give readers two plus two, don’t simply tell readers the answer is four. Show what the character takes in and let the reader do the math. Create an immersive experience where the reader has to lean in and care, to sympathize, to cheer for the characters because they know how this feels!

Emotions are universal across time and geography. The expression of those emotions, the understanding, social acceptability, of emotions is what changes. The reader may not know what it’s like to have a sword in hand and fight Vikings trying to destroy their village, but they understand being the underdog, they understand loss and fear.

Do you regularly make use of personification in your writing?

Examples of First Person Deep POV

August 8, 2022 by Lisa Hall-Wilson 7 Comments

First person POV is automatically deep pov, right? NOPE. They are very different, though first person POV stories may use elements of deep pov, there’s a lot more to deep pov than most realize.

I recently did a guest post on why first person pov is not deep pov (at least, not automatically as some assume). But, over and over my students and readers tell me that what they find most helpful is examples.

So, go read that first post and then come back – or read the recap below.

Quick Recap: What Is First Person POV?

First Person POV is a story told from the I, me, we, us perspective, and it relies quite heavily on a narrator voice. In third person POV, that “narrator” becomes the author voice.

The function of this narrator/author voice is to summarize, explain, give details the character wouldn’t know or think about, skim details, skip time, give descriptions of things the character might not notice on their own, recap history or deliver backstory. Particularly in first person POV, the character either directly speaks to the reader (breaks the fourth wall) or assumes the reader is listening in.

In deep POV, every word on the page comes from within the character, and while the reader is a fly on the wall inside the character’s head, the character doesn’t acknowledge, talk to, think of the reader at all. Everything happens in real time. So, there’s no place for the author voice to summarize, explain, skim, describe, skip over time, etc.

Some people find deep POV claustrophobic, too intense, too limiting. Others love the directness, intensity and intimacy of this style of writing. There’s no right or wrong answer.

But First Person Uses Deep POV…

Some have said to me, but first person IS deep POV. There’s no dialogue tags or filter words.

Deep POV is a collection of stylistic choices that aim to immerse the reader in the character’s lived experience of the story. Emotions are the glue that makes deep POV have so much power. So yes, many of the big names writing in first person POV (Margaret Atwood comes to mind) advocate to remove dialogue tags (he said/she said) and use beats, and this is one element of deep POV. Many advocate to remove filter words that add narrative distance, and this is also one element of deep POV.

But there’s SO MUCH MORE to deep POV than these two stylistic choices. And, that narrator/author voice is really the big stickler that differentiates the two.

Filter Words And Summary In First Person POV

I’ve used bold text to show where the author/narrator voice is creeping in.

First Person POV: A heavy pounding on the front door caused my heart to leap into my throat and I fell off the couch where I’d been sleeping. I bellowed at the door. “Who’s there?” Everyone who’d ever bother to visit knew better than to appear before noon. It was only 8am.

There are still filter words here – caused. Words like made, forced, caused add narrative distance. Just show the reaction instead of narrating it. A heavy pounding rattled the front door in its frame. My heart leaped into my throat.

‘Where I’d been sleeping’ is summarizing. Show where they were sleeping. A heavy pounding rattled the front door in its frame. My heart leaped into my throat and I fell off the sofa. I rubbed the sleep from my eyes.

The last line is an omniscient narrator voice, which not every first person POV would employ, but do you see how it’s summarizing and explaining many WHYS in this scene? Why are they surprised? Why are they annoyed? There’s also some backstory that assumes a reader is listening into the character’s thoughts.

Limited Third Person POV: A heavy pounding on the front door sounded through the house. Sam bolted upright on the sofa and then hit the floor. He got to his feet, his heart pounding in his throat, hands shaking. He never got out of bed before noon. “Who’s there?”

Words like heard, saw, wanted, (sounded is a tricksy workaround that doesn’t work) etc. are more examples of filter words. This adds narrative distance. Show me how this sound affects the character. The “he never got out of bed before noon” is the author voice explaining things to the reader.

Deep POV: A heavy thick-fisted pounding rattled the front door. I bolted upright on the sofa and tipped. My heart leaped into my throat and I hit the floor. The tendrils of the nightmare slipped from my memory like sunlight on fog again. My stomach and chest ache, my hands shaking. I take a deep breath and exhale through my mouth until the ache recedes. I’m home, not back there. Tapped my phone. 8am. A reminder popped up: Plumber. “Who’s there?”

This rewrite aims to remove the author/narrator voice explaining or summarizing what’s going on. I also hoped to give the reader a peek into the WHY behind their reaction without a backstory dump that required explanation or the author voice to interrupt what’s going on.

Using the narrator/author voice isn’t wrong, but if your goal is deep POV you have to remove those because what you want is the lived experience, not a summary of the lived experience. Instead of TELLING a story, have the character simply live out the story in an immersive way?

Ask yourself WHY your character is doing or thinking or deciding things. Ask how the character FEELS using what Psychology Today calls the Orchestra of silent communication: internal physical feelings (heart rate, circulation, etc), external physical feelings (bumping into things, squished toes, etc), emotions, gestures, expressions, movement – all the things. Decide on a few relevant details that will show the impact, mood, setting, etc. of the scene. Be strategic.

Removing The Narrator Voice In First Person POV

First Person POV: The first day we stumbled upon that old cabin in the woods, we knew it would change everything.

All of this is the narrator voice. The voice is talking to the reader directly. Additionally, the narrator is summarizing what’s about to happen from a time in the future. This doesn’t happen in deep POV.

Deep POV: I chased Jake through the woods, the branches pulling and snagging at my shirt, the long grass trying to trip up my feet. I was too fast though. I jumped over a log, and fell, and the ground disappeared. I shrieked. My backside hit ground. Heels dragging furrows ahead of me until I stopped. Sand in my shorts, sand in my mouth. I shook it out of my hair. Jake stood nearby, looking up. I stood, rubbing the sore parts and cursing. My shoes now a size too small with all the sand in them. An old tree, twisted and tangled, stood with its roots crawling across the ground, holding up an ancient cabin. My mouth gaped.

Jake nudged me with his wrist and took off running. “I saw it first!”

Nobody was going to believe what we’d found.

Deep POV explores the in-real-time lived experience, and doesn’t filter it through a narrator voice or the author. Every word on the page comes from the character, from within the character.

The Narrator Voice Drawing Conclusions

First Person POV: I could tell Tom was lying.

Deep POV: I waited, my arms folded over my heart. Tom wouldn’t meet my gaze. He just shuffled his weight from one foot to the other, hands shoved so deep in his pockets his wrists disappeared.

Don’t TELL the reader Tom is lying, SHOW the reader why that POV character thinks Tom is lying. What information have they taken in that gives that character the impression that Tom is lying? That’s the shift that needs to happen in deep POV.

Go Deeper With Emotions And Remove Narrative Distance

First Person POV: Despite everything I’d just said, he was still leaving. But he couldn’t leave. He was breaking my heart.

Deep POV: I cleared my throat and blinked back the tears. My chest gaped open, there was nothing left to say. He jingled his keys in his pocket, staring out the window. “I never knew you felt that way.” He shrugged and reached for the door. “But it doesn’t change anything.”

He shut the door behind him. My knees gave out and a wailing noise filled the room. A vice wrapped around my throat. Tears rushed down my face and down my neck. My whole body an open wound and he’d just poured salt on it.

The first person POV example is the narrator voice summarizing what’s going on, it’s keeping the reader at a safe distance. The narrator concludes for the reader what is going on, where deep POV gives the reader the information they use to reach their conclusion without stating it.

Don’t tell the reader the character’s heart is breaking, show what a broken heart FEELS like to that character in that moment. In real life, we don’t take in a scene and then tell ourselves what we’ve concluded – we don’t narrate our actions to ourselves, we just take the next step and act. Let the reader draw their own conclusions. And this is really really hard when you’re full of doubt about whether the reader “gets it”, but that’s what critique partners and beta readers are for.

Deep POV aims to immerse the reader in the character’s lived experience, as it happens. Emotions, the visceral, unfiltered, vulnerable, messy, and intimate exploration of emotions is what makes deep POV so powerful. I don’t tell the reader the POV character’s heart is broken, I show (tried to show) what a broken heart felt like to THAT character, RIGHT NOW.

A Warning About Editors…

Editors not familiar with deep POV will look at these deep POV examples and say it’s navel-gazing, it’s slowing the plot – that it has to go. Deep POV will add to your word count, and it will slow the pace of your story (in places). They will want you to add in the narrator/author voice in places, summarize and explain “to keep the pace moving”, but that narrow focus of the lens is THE POINT.

This is the mindshift change that happens with deep POV. You need to strategically employ distance and telling in deep POV, like you do with every other POV style, but this is what “go deeper” looks like. Deep POV employs this curiosity of raw emotions, the lived experience of the story with intimate detail, forces t he reader to lean in and participate (think) to know what’s going on, and consequently immerses the reader in that character’s perspective and journey.

Ask prospective editors if they’re familiar with deep POV and ask to see examples of (or links to) work they’ve edited written in deep POV. Look at the examples – are they in deep POV? Look for dialogue tags. The narrator voice. Filter words. The kind of telling that’s allowed with a narrator/author voice, but is avoided in deep POV. Is the story told in real time – no hindsight or looking ahead. Does the character assume there’s a reader listening in? Some people don’t know deep POV is different than limited third person, and different from first person POV.

I’ll be posting on my own blog regularly instead of only guest posting. What aspects of deep pov would you like to see my blog about? Would you like to see me post more examples of other styles put into deep POV?