Writing a Children's Book

Lesson 5: Beginning your Book.

Viewpoint

Viewpoint and tense are important to any kind of writing. There is no one “correct” viewpoint for a children’s book, but it’s useful to know the advantages and disadvantages of each kind.

First Person is a common viewpoint in children’s books. In first person, a main character (usually the protagonist) is telling the story directly to the readers.

The major advantage of first person narration is that it is very accessible and direct.

The narrator can speak with hindsight, giving the readers more information than s/he actually had at the time. Some readers enjoy the vicarious feeling of “being” the main character.

There are disadvantages, too. Using first person viewpoint usually means that only one viewpoint is available. If the narrator wasn’t present at a key event, then s/he has to tell it at second hand. Having a young narrator also means that everything has to be filtered through a child’s viewpoint. There are some things the narrator can’t tell the readers because s/he isn’t mature enough to understand them.

Some writers forget that children and teenagers use syntax and vocabulary that differs from that used by most adult writers. If your child narrator comes out sounding like an adult, you’ve gone wrong.

Using an Animal Narrator

When using an animal narrator to tell a first person story, be sure to remember that animal perceptions are very different from human understanding. Some animals can’t see colour, and dogs will see everything from lower down than a human would, and will also rely more on their noses than their eyes.

Multi-First Person is a viewpoint in which two or more protagonists take it in turns to tell the story. This means that whoever was present can tell key parts of the story, and offers a chance to have more than one “voice”.

The disadvantage is that occasionally readers get confused as to who is telling which bit. The younger the readers, the more explicit you need to make the changes in narrator.

Third Person Limited means that the story is told in the third person (the protagonist is referred to as “she” or “he” or “Lucy” rather than “I” and “me”), but that events are still seen through only one set of eyes. If the protagonist isn’t present in a scene, then the scene can be told only in dialogue as someone else fills Lucy in, or else by a transition passage beginning: “Later, Lucy discovered that…”.

Multi-Third Person Limited is a very useful viewpoint. It gives main characters (and occasionally others) turns at being “viewpoint” character. “Trinity Street” is a multi-third person limited novel.

Omniscient Viewpoint is less common than it was. You might call true omniscient viewpoint the “God’s Eye View”, because the reader knows what everyone thinks and what everyone does. One character may not know what the others are thinking, but the reader does. In omniscient viewpoint a character can be seen from the outside as well as from the inside, so you might write; “Lucy’s green eyes seemed to turn dark as she remembered her dream.” You couldn’t write that in third person limited, because the reader would be privy to Lucy’s thoughts but not to the way her eyes looked.

“The Orange Outlaw” is close to omniscient viewpoint, but although we see the protagonists from both inside and outside, we see Uncle Warren and other adults from the outside only.

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