Party Crashers by Jason Black
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Who invited this guy?[/caption]
So you’re at a party. You’re talking to somebody you know, or maybe talking with a couple of friends. The conversation is flowing, and you’re having a good time. Then some random person you barely know comes ambling up to your little convo, drink in hand. It’s that guy who’s all, “hey, I want to share this intimacy you have with your friends, even though I don’t know you and you didn’t invite me. Pay attention to me!”
You know who I mean, don’t you? Sure. We’ve all met that guy. And don’t you just hate him? This guy who barges in, ruins the comfortable vibe you’ve got going on with your real friends, all for the sake of his own selfish, needy motives to be the center of attention? Jeez. Who invited him to the party, anyway?
To be fair, maybe the guy’s not all bad. Maybe he’s just new in town, doesn’t know anybody yet, and is trying to make friends. Maybe, if you and he had been the first ones at the party, you might have struck up a very nice conversation with him while the hosts were off preparing canapés. It’s entirely possible that he’s a perfectly nice guy, who in different circumstances or different timing, you might have hit it off with really well.
But when he drops in on a personal moment between you and your real friends? Not so much. When that happens, it’s an uncomfortable feeling for all concerned.
This is exactly what happens to readers when you drop viewpoint characters onto them too late in the story. In this metaphor, you are the reader. The party is the story, and your friends are the viewpoint characters. That guy? He’s a viewpoint character who drops into the story too late.
Had you met that character at the start of the party, in chapter 1 or 2 or something, then sure. You could have gotten to know him while you were still getting acclimated to the party environment as a whole. And who knows, you might have hit it off. But once you’re into the groove of the party, once you’re having a good time with people you know, it’s too late.
The viewpoint characters who do show up in a book’s early chapters, those are the ones who become the reader’s friends. Readers get to know them while they’re still acclimating to the story. Once the reader gets to chapter 15 or 25 or whatever, they have become comfortable with the story and with the characters who the story’s camera is following. Drop somebody new on them—regardless of how much the reader might have liked that character had they met him early on—you run a risk of turning the reader off simply because it’s too late. You’ve turned the character into a party crasher.
How do you know when it is too late to introduce a new viewpoint character? Well, obviously there’s no bright line in the sand, no magical page number beyond which you can’t get away with it. Some readers are naturally gregarious and are always willing to admit new people into their conversations. But most aren’t so willing to let their intimate dance with the characters they love be interrupted by random new people.
I can give you some general guidance, though. If you need multiple viewpoint characters, do your best to introduce all of them as early as you can. One per chapter in the first few chapters is a good way to go. Barbara Kingsolver’s Prodigal Summer is a great example of this. Basically, if the book is going to jump around between different viewpoint characters at all, readers need to know it soon so they can have that as an expectation in their minds.
What do you do if the structure of your story demands the late addition of a new viewpoint character? Well, you have to start a new party. Remember, your readers are in the groove. They have made friends with your early characters, and by and large will want to stick with those people. Thus, you have to reset your readers’ groove to the point where they will be willing to talk to some new people. The best, simplest way I know of to do this is to separate your book into a multi-part structure. Put in a hard visual break of a full page with nothing but the words “Part 2” on it. That’s a strong signal readers can’t really miss, and lets them know, “Oh, hey, the story is taking a radical jump here. It’s a new party now.” Then introduce your new person in the first scene of part 2. If the old characters show up again too, great! Readers will be hoping they will, and when they do, they arrive as comfortable old friends who help us get our groove back.
Deep down, this is a question of changing the rules. Readers develop an understanding of what rules a story is operating under, which includes the story’s use of viewpoint characters. Viewpoint character rules inform readers’ sensibilities about how the story is coming to them and their relationship to the narrator(s). A story shown through the police detective’s eyes is a totally different animal than the exact same plot shown through the detective’s eyes and the killer’s. These rules matter greatly to how readers interpret the story, so if you suddenly change the rules by dropping in a new viewpoint character, you risk the reader’s stern displeasure.
Readers build this understanding page by page from what the story shows them. The further they read, the more justifiably sure they are that they understand what rules the story is playing by. Ultimately, after the reader becomes certain they understand the story’s rules is when it’s truly too late to introduce a new viewpoint character. So introduce your viewpoint characters early, before they turn into party crashers, and you’ll be fine.
Who invited this guy?[/caption]So you’re at a party. You’re talking to somebody you know, or maybe talking with a couple of friends. The conversation is flowing, and you’re having a good time. Then some random person you barely know comes ambling up to your little convo, drink in hand. It’s that guy who’s all, “hey, I want to share this intimacy you have with your friends, even though I don’t know you and you didn’t invite me. Pay attention to me!”
You know who I mean, don’t you? Sure. We’ve all met that guy. And don’t you just hate him? This guy who barges in, ruins the comfortable vibe you’ve got going on with your real friends, all for the sake of his own selfish, needy motives to be the center of attention? Jeez. Who invited him to the party, anyway?
To be fair, maybe the guy’s not all bad. Maybe he’s just new in town, doesn’t know anybody yet, and is trying to make friends. Maybe, if you and he had been the first ones at the party, you might have struck up a very nice conversation with him while the hosts were off preparing canapés. It’s entirely possible that he’s a perfectly nice guy, who in different circumstances or different timing, you might have hit it off with really well.
But when he drops in on a personal moment between you and your real friends? Not so much. When that happens, it’s an uncomfortable feeling for all concerned.
This is exactly what happens to readers when you drop viewpoint characters onto them too late in the story. In this metaphor, you are the reader. The party is the story, and your friends are the viewpoint characters. That guy? He’s a viewpoint character who drops into the story too late.
Had you met that character at the start of the party, in chapter 1 or 2 or something, then sure. You could have gotten to know him while you were still getting acclimated to the party environment as a whole. And who knows, you might have hit it off. But once you’re into the groove of the party, once you’re having a good time with people you know, it’s too late.
The viewpoint characters who do show up in a book’s early chapters, those are the ones who become the reader’s friends. Readers get to know them while they’re still acclimating to the story. Once the reader gets to chapter 15 or 25 or whatever, they have become comfortable with the story and with the characters who the story’s camera is following. Drop somebody new on them—regardless of how much the reader might have liked that character had they met him early on—you run a risk of turning the reader off simply because it’s too late. You’ve turned the character into a party crasher.
How do you know when it is too late to introduce a new viewpoint character? Well, obviously there’s no bright line in the sand, no magical page number beyond which you can’t get away with it. Some readers are naturally gregarious and are always willing to admit new people into their conversations. But most aren’t so willing to let their intimate dance with the characters they love be interrupted by random new people.
I can give you some general guidance, though. If you need multiple viewpoint characters, do your best to introduce all of them as early as you can. One per chapter in the first few chapters is a good way to go. Barbara Kingsolver’s Prodigal Summer is a great example of this. Basically, if the book is going to jump around between different viewpoint characters at all, readers need to know it soon so they can have that as an expectation in their minds.
What do you do if the structure of your story demands the late addition of a new viewpoint character? Well, you have to start a new party. Remember, your readers are in the groove. They have made friends with your early characters, and by and large will want to stick with those people. Thus, you have to reset your readers’ groove to the point where they will be willing to talk to some new people. The best, simplest way I know of to do this is to separate your book into a multi-part structure. Put in a hard visual break of a full page with nothing but the words “Part 2” on it. That’s a strong signal readers can’t really miss, and lets them know, “Oh, hey, the story is taking a radical jump here. It’s a new party now.” Then introduce your new person in the first scene of part 2. If the old characters show up again too, great! Readers will be hoping they will, and when they do, they arrive as comfortable old friends who help us get our groove back.
Deep down, this is a question of changing the rules. Readers develop an understanding of what rules a story is operating under, which includes the story’s use of viewpoint characters. Viewpoint character rules inform readers’ sensibilities about how the story is coming to them and their relationship to the narrator(s). A story shown through the police detective’s eyes is a totally different animal than the exact same plot shown through the detective’s eyes and the killer’s. These rules matter greatly to how readers interpret the story, so if you suddenly change the rules by dropping in a new viewpoint character, you risk the reader’s stern displeasure.
Readers build this understanding page by page from what the story shows them. The further they read, the more justifiably sure they are that they understand what rules the story is playing by. Ultimately, after the reader becomes certain they understand the story’s rules is when it’s truly too late to introduce a new viewpoint character. So introduce your viewpoint characters early, before they turn into party crashers, and you’ll be fine.
