writing a book review in third person

How to Write a Professional Book Review

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Arvyn Cerézo

Arvyn Cerézo is an arts and culture writer/reporter with bylines in Book Riot , Publishers Weekly , South China Morning Post , PhilSTAR Life , the Asian Review of Books , and other publications. You can find them on arvyncerezo.com and @ArvynCerezo on Twitter.

View All posts by Arvyn Cerézo

With the boom of Goodreads and book blogging in the past few years, everyone became self-proclaimed book critics. But as much fun as it is writing about books, these platforms don’t let writers earn bucks on the side.

But here’s the thing: You can use your book blogging skills to try writing a professional book review—trade book review—and make some quick cash. Trade reviews are published in established outlets like Publishers Weekly , Kirkus Reviews , and The New York Times among others.

How to Write a Professional Book Review l BookRiot.com (Source: https://www.pexels.com/photo/person-holding-white-and-brown-newspaper-3957616/)

Want to know how to write a professional book review and start side hustling? Read on.

I’ve been reviewing for a couple of years now for some book review outlets. Although I only have a few years on my belt, I’ve learned enough to be able to share some basic tips. Here are some of them:

Get to Know the Best Reviewing Practices

There are a lot of book review publications out there, and their reviewing guidelines vary. If accepted as a reviewer for a publication, make sure to ask your editor about the best reviewing practices.

You can also read the publication’s published reviews to get the tone and the writing style to use.

Fine-Tune Your Language

Reviewing for trade publications requires a shift of language tone. Book critics, more or less, are unbiased, firm, and straightforward in writing their reviews.

In a book review blog, however, you can be more friendly and playful with your tone. You are also free to let your feelings out or even spill your guts in the book review.

Take a look at these examples:

Book blog: “I didn’t like this book, so I give it two stars. Not recommended!”

Trade book review: “While the mystery around the main character carries the story forward, the plot meanders a lot. Horror readers will be disappointed.”

As you might notice, the tone of trade book reviews are authoritative and matter-of-fact. You can also do the same by being objective in your approach.

Avoid Showing Uncertainty or Doubt

This is common in book blogging. While there’s nothing really wrong with letting your unfiltered thoughts flow in writing, this is not recommended in trade review writing.

Avoid using words like “I think,” “This might,” “This could” etc. to convey your convictions. Instead, use words that show firm opinions like “will” and “can.”

Here are some examples:

Book blog: “Well, not for me but I think this might interest fantasy readers.”

Trade book review: “Fast-paced and high-stakes, fantasy readers will keep turning pages.”

Don’t Copy Goodreads Descriptions

Don’t paraphrase them either. It will be very obvious, and you might be accused of plagiarism.

If you read the book, then rehash the plot from your mind. You can do so by writing important plot points from A to B and C to D. To avoid errors, fact check what you’re writing by consulting the book.

Be Mindful of What You Say

With book blogging, you can say whatever you want. It’s your opinion as a reader after all. But if you’re a professional book reviewer, you just can’t say a book is shitty without providing evidence.

Did it suck because it’s slow-paced? Are the characters one-dimensional? Is the book full of clichés? State it in your review and provide examples such as sample texts or passages.

Don’t Drop Spoilers

Most traditional review outlets don’t do this either. Why? It’s simply because readers click on your article to see whether they’ll like the book or not.

With book blogging, you can get away with adding a “Spoiler Alert” warning. And then, you can gush out how excited or exasperated you were by what happened to your favorite character.

However, that’s not a good practice in trade book reviews. Just write enough plot summaries that won’t disclose revelations (like a character dying).

Write in Third-Person Point of View

To sound objective, authoritative, and all-knowing in your reviews, write in third-person point of review.

Avoid using the “I” pronoun as much as possible.

Review Books You Only Like

I have some blogger friends who are required to write a review in exchange for the books they didn’t ask for but received. But what if they didn’t like the books at all?

If the book didn’t pique your interest in the first place, don’t review it. You run the risk of giving a negative review to a rather stellar book.

With professional book reviewing, you can pitch to editors only the books you like to read. You are not pressured to review books just because you received them for free.

Don’t Leave a Star Rating

Sure, this might be fun to do on Goodreads and in your book review blog. It can easily indicate your stand for a book.

However, this is not a standard practice in trade review publications. Instead, they have a different version of showing a book’s merit: the “ starred reviews .” If part of the publication’s policy, you can leave a star on a book to indicate quality.

These are just some basic tips on how to write a professional book review. While guidelines and practices vary per publication, the tips above are generally applicable in trade review writing.

If you want to further sharpen your reviewing chops, you can also read these guidelines: How to Write a Book Review .

writing a book review in third person

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7 Essential Tips for Writing in the Third Person

7 Essential Tips for Writing in the Third Person

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writing a book review in third person

Alana Chase

Whether you’re a student, business professional, or writer, knowing how to write well in the third person is an essential skill.

But you may not be sure of all the rules or how to make your third-person writing shine.

As an editor and writing coach of 11 years, I’ve taught students and writers at all levels how to master the third-person point of view (POV). All you need to get started is a good understanding of third-person pronouns and a bit of practice for consistency. 

By the end of this article, you’ll know when and how to use third-person perspective. You'll also find helpful tips for taking your third-person writing to the next level.

Key takeaways 

  • In the third-person perspective, the narrator is separate from the story. 
  • Third-person perspective uses he/him/his, she/her/hers, and they/them/their pronouns. 
  • Consistency is key: Don’t switch between perspectives in a single document.
  • Practicing third-person writing and editing your work is vital to improving your skills.

What is third-person point of view (POV)?

In writing, there are three ways to tell a story: first-person, second-person, or third-person POV. 

First-person POV is from the narrator’s perspective: 

“ I saw the bird steal my sandwich, and I ran after it.”

Second-person POV is from the reader’s perspective: 

“ You saw the bird steal your sandwich, and you ran after it.”

Third-person POV, however, separates the narrator from the story and uses third-person pronouns (like he/him, she/her, and they/them) to describe events, actions, thoughts, and emotions. Characters are referred to by name or one of these pronouns: 

“ Alex saw the bird steal his/her/their sandwich, and he/she/they ran after it.”

Third-person POV is used in all kinds of writing — from novels to research papers, journalistic articles, copywriting materials, and more. Check out some examples below.

Examples of third-person perspective

  • In a novel: “Robb and Jon sat tall and still on their horses, with Bran between them on his pony, trying to seem older than seven, trying to pretend that he’d seen all this before.” (From A Game of Thrones by George R. R. Martin)
  • In a news article : “This weekend, Iceland experienced nearly 2,000 earthquakes within 48 hours. And they’ve kept coming since then – in swarms.” (From “Thousands of earthquakes have scientists watching for a volcanic eruption in Iceland” on NPR’s website )
  • In copywriting : “Balm Dotcom’s formula has antioxidants and natural emollients to nourish dry lips.” (Website copy describing Glossier’s Balm Dotcom lip product )

7 tips for writing in the third person

Just like the first and second person, you’ve probably already written in the third person before. But to do it well , you’ll need some key tips and tricks in your writing toolkit. 

Let’s dive into the seven essentials for third-person writing.

Tip 1: Use third-person determiners and pronouns 

In grammar, determiners introduce and modify nouns. They’re used to specify what a noun refers to (like “ my laptop”) or the quantity of it (like “ many sandwiches”). 

Meanwhile, pronouns are substitutes for nouns, referring to people, places, or things. For example, “Caroline [noun] is a skilled musician, and she [pronoun] especially loves playing the piano.”

When you write in the third person, use only third-person determiners and pronouns. Let’s take a look at the different types of pronouns. 

writing a book review in third person

Tip 2: Use names for clarity

In third-person writing, using names is crucial for clarity, especially when multiple people/characters share similar pronouns. Strategically incorporate names into your writing to help readers keep track of who’s who. 

For example:

‍ “She submitted the script draft to her, and she made suggestions for changes.”
‍ “Mira submitted the script draft to Lynn, and Lynn made suggestions for changes.”

Tip: Use a character or person’s name when introducing them in your writing. Then, alternate between using pronouns and their name to prevent confusion.

Tip 3: Keep the narration neutral

When you write in the third person, your narrator is an uninvolved observer. They have no opinions on the people, places, things, or events they describe. Their words and tone should be neutral (but not boring).

To achieve this in your writing:

  • Think of your narrator as a reporter. Their job is to detail what’s happening, when and why it’s occurring, who’s involved, and any background information that can give context. They don’t offer a personal interpretation of events. Instead, they provide facts and supporting details.
  • Save the judgment for characters. Rather than having your narrator share their critique of events or individuals, have a character offer their opinion — either through dialogue, actions, or reactions. For instance, instead of writing, “Dr. Shaw was a courageous woman,” let a character convey admiration by telling Dr. Shaw, “I’ve always admired your fearlessness.”
  • Be objective with your descriptions. Avoid subjective adjectives and focus on observable features. For example, instead of describing a landscape as “breathtaking,” write that it’s “marked with snow-capped mountains and patches of tall pine trees.” 

Tip 4: Use descriptive language

Showing — and not just telling — is essential when writing in the third person. Instead of stating emotions and experiences outright, immerse your reader in your character’s reality. Create vivid descriptions of their thoughts, feelings, and surroundings. Use language that engages the senses: sight, sound, smell, touch, and taste. 

For example: 

“Aisha was nervous.”
‍ “Aisha’s hands trembled, and her tongue felt dry against the roof of her mouth. The spotlight above the stage shone white-hot, causing beads of sweat to form along Aisha’s hairline.”

Tip 5: Be consistent

Once you establish a third-person POV, stick to it . Avoid switching from the third person to the first or second person. Otherwise, you’ll confuse the reader and disrupt the flow of your writing.

“Hannah felt a surge of excitement when her telephone rang, anticipating good news about her mortgage application. I felt my heart rate quicken as I answered.” (Switches from the third person to the first person)
“Hannah felt a surge of excitement when her telephone rang, anticipating good news about her mortgage application. She felt her heart rate quicken as she answered.” (Remains in the third person)

Tip 6: Practice

Writing in the third person might feel strange at first, especially if you’re used to using the first or second person. However, it’ll come more naturally to you with practice.

Here are two writing exercises you can try right now:

Writing Exercise #1

Take an excerpt from an article or book written in the first or second person and rewrite it in the third person. Below is an example using The Catcher in the Rye , whose main character is named Holden.

Before: “The other reason I wasn’t down at the game was because I was on my way to say good-by to old Spencer, my history teacher.”

After: “The other reason Holden wasn’t down at the game was because he was on his way to say good-by to old Spencer, his history teacher.”

Writing Exercise #2

Turn on a movie or television show, mute the sound, and closely observe two characters. Give them each a name. Using third-person pronouns and their names, describe the characters’ actions and what you believe they’re thinking and feeling. 

Above all, write in the third person as often as possible , following the tips in this guide. Remember, your writing skills are like muscles: The more you exercise them, the stronger they become. 

Tip 7: Carefully revise 

After you’ve written something in the third person, carefully review and revise your work. 

Check that your writing :

  • Uses third-person determiners and pronouns accurately and consistently
  • Incorporates names where pronouns may cause confusion
  • Maintains a neutral tone, where your narrator doesn’t offer personal opinions or interpretations
  • Doesn’t shift to the first or second person

Make changes where necessary, then read through your work a final time.

AI tip: Wordtune can help you self-edit and help improve your writing overall.

Paste your work into Wordtune’s Editor, or write in it directly, and use the features to shorten or expand your sentences, make your tone more casual or formal, and more. Wordtune will also automatically flag spelling and grammar errors and suggest ways to improve concision, clarity, and flow.

The Casual button in Wordtune takes highlighted text and suggests more casual-sounding replacements.

Get Wordtune for free > Get Wordtune for free >

Bonus tip (advanced): Learn the different types of third-person POV

Did you know there are three types of third-person POV? Getting familiar with them can help you make your writing even more impactful.

  • Third-person objective , where the narrator is “a fly on the wall”: They provide an objective account of events without exploring people/characters’ emotions or thoughts.
  • Third-person omniscient , where the narrator has unlimited knowledge of all events and characters’ thoughts and feelings. 
  • Third-person limited , also called “close third,” where the narrator has access to just one character’s emotions, thoughts, and experiences. 

With this knowledge, you can choose the right perspective for your writing depending on its purpose, tone, and goals. 

For instance, use third-person omniscient to show readers what’s happening with everyone in your novel. Or, you could go for third-person objective in an academic paper where you must present facts without sharing your interpretation of them.

Writing well in the third person takes thought and effort. You must use third-person determiners and pronouns, weave in descriptive language, and keep your narration neutral. You also need to be consistent with your POV, ensuring you don’t accidentally switch to the first or second person. Finally, review and revise your work to make sure it’s clear and error-free. 

Using this guide — and Wordtune’s tools to polish your writing — you’ll get the hang of the third-person perspective in no time.

To continue sharpening your writing skills, read our articles on mastering tone of voice and writing concisely (with help from AI). Then, check out our proofreading guide to keep your work flawless . 

What is a third-person word example?

Third-person words are pronouns like “he,” “her,” “they,” “it,” “hers,” and “theirs.”

Should I write in the first or third person?

It depends on the closeness you want to create with your audience. The first person allows for a personal connection between the narrator and the reader, while the third person creates distance between the narrator and the audience.

What are the disadvantages of writing in the third person?

Third-person writing can lead to a lack of intimacy with the reader. This can be a disadvantage for some writers but an advantage for others, like those in academic and professional settings.

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How to Write in Third Person Point of View

Sarah Oakley

Sarah Oakley

how to write in third person

Whether you’re going to write a short story, a novella, or a novel, one of the most important decisions you’ll need to make is which point of view (POV) to use.

Third person is the most popular POV for fiction writers to use. It gives the reader a chance to experience the narrative from a perspective above, or on the shoulder of, the characters.

In this article, we’ll learn what the third person POV is, how it compares to other points of view, and how to write in third person point of view.

What Is Third Person Point of View?

Third person pov meaning, how to write in third person, third person pov examples, conclusion on how to write in third person pov.

Third person POV is when the narrator exists outside of the story. This narrator relates the actions of the characters by using their name or third person pronouns such as “she,” “he,” and “they.”

There are three types of third person POV that you can choose from. Each POV provides a different reader experience as they reveal different amounts of information about the narrative, characters, and setting.

To decide on a POV, think about the type of story you are telling and whether your readers need to be aware of certain details at each point in the plot.

Third person narrators

1. Third Person Objective Point of View

The third person objective POV is a way to tell your story by giving the reader all the details within the scenes without including what is going on in the characters’ minds.

To write in the third person objective POV, you will need to create an unbiased narrator who doesn’t tell the reader the thoughts and feelings of the characters. Instead, your narrator will simply relay the actions and dialogue of the story in an objective, impartial telling of the events.

This is great for keeping distance between the reader and the characters. It’s like looking through the window of a stranger’s house and trying to figure out why everything is happening.

2. Third Person Omniscient Point of View

When writing in the third person omniscient POV, you give your reader an all-access pass to the thoughts and feelings of any character in each scene of your story. You can give as much detail about the scene as you can in the third person objective POV, but this time you can also include information from the characters’ perspectives.

The narrator you create to speak in the third person omniscient POV will need to relay the thoughts and feelings of all the relevant characters in the scene. You can do this by switching perspectives. This is sometimes called “head hopping.”

You can use head hopping to show conflict in the story. For example, one paragraph is from the main character’s perspective, as they give some important information to another character. Then, the next paragraph is from the perspective of the person who received the information, which shows their reaction to what the main character just said.

Third person omniscient is perfect for sharing all the little details about the world you have created and allows the reader to pick up clues that some characters might not have noticed. Some writers refer to the third person omniscient POV as an all-seeing being who likes to give their thoughts on the plot.

3. Third Person Limited Point of View

This narrator sits on the shoulder of your main character and tells the story from their perspective. It’s close to being first person, but the reader isn’t solely within the character’s mind and this narrator still uses third person pronouns and verbs.

Sometimes, the third person limited POV narrator sticks to a different character each chapter instead of one character throughout the entire story. We refer to this as a viewpoint character, as we are seeing the world from their perspective.

You are controlling the amount of information given to the reader by focusing on one character’s awareness, rather than all characters’.

First Person vs Third Person

First person POV gives readers full access to the thoughts and feelings of the main character, as they are the one telling the story. There isn’t a narrator getting between the reader and the character.

Another key part of writing in the first person POV is that the character uses first person pronouns to tell the story. They use “I,” “me,” “my,” and “myself” as they are talking about actions and experiences.

Remember : not all main characters notice everything going on around them. It can break the reader’s immersion if they are wondering how the main character knew they were about to die, but there were no clues it was about to happen. Not all characters are psychic!

first person vs third person

If you’re aiming to stick to one character’s thoughts and feelings, but you also want to add in some extra details that are in the character’s peripheral vision, try the third person limited perspective.

This POV can be used to great effect in thrillers where you want to stay close to the main character, so the reader connects with them.

Meanwhile, you can also give clues about things that are about to happen that the character is unaware of. Let us watch in horror as the character falls down a hole we all saw coming, but could do nothing to stop them.

Second Person vs Third Person

Second person POV puts you, the reader, in the driving seat as the main character. The narrator breaks the fourth wall and speaks to you directly.

This perspective uses second person pronouns such as “you,” “your,” and “yourself” to bring the reader into the narrative. The narrator uses third person pronouns to refer to other characters.

Second person works well in stories where you want full immersion for the reader. Some people love the feeling of being dropped onto the rollercoaster of drama in a good story. This is why second person is used in video games and Choose Your Own Adventure stories.

However, it is one of the least used POV types by fiction writers. One reason for this is that it takes a lot of skill to write about the reader in a way that feels natural to them while also giving away the right amount of information for the story. You don’t want your reader to lose interest because they don’t agree with something the narrator has said.

second person vs third person objective

Third person objective would be a better option if you don’t want to write as though your story is about the person reading it. The third person POV allows the reader to focus more on the narrative and everything else that’s going on around the characters.

So far, we’ve discussed what the third person POV is, but what does the “third person” part of that mean?

Third person is a grammatical style of writing that uses pronouns such as “she,” “he,” “they,” and “it.” It also uses proper nouns and names when referring to specific individuals and objects.

1. Decide If Third Person Provides the Right Reader Experience

Do you want to tell the story from within the mind of your main character? Do you want to make the reader the main character of the story? If the answer is no to both questions, it’s time to look at your options for writing in the third person.

2. Pick the Type of Third Person Narrator

Go over the details of your story and your characters. You will need to establish whether third person limited, third person objective, or third person omniscient is the best POV for your story.

3. Read Examples of Writing in Third Person

It’s important to take the time to analyze what works and what doesn’t work in third person narration. The best way to do this is by reading other works that use third person points of view.

Focus on the information they are sharing. Did it work? Would you have used a different type of narrator for that story?

4. Use a Consistent POV

Switching POVs is a habit that a lot of writers do if they’re writing in a POV they’re not used to. Don’t worry, it happens. However, being aware that this is something to avoid before you get 200 pages into your novel and realize you switched POVs back on page 90 can help you be more observant of your writing habits.

5. Use the Correct Pronouns—ProWritingAid Can Help!

The third person POV means using third person pronouns when your narrator is speaking. Remembering this is one of the best ways to catch yourself from slipping into different points of view.

first vs second vs third person pronouns

You can stop yourself from using the wrong pronouns by using ProWritingAid’s pronoun report. It’ll highlight all the examples of pronouns in your text, so you can easily work through your story and change them back into the third person if you’ve made any mistakes.

6. Create a Trustworthy Third Person Narrator

Your third person narrator is the voice of your narrative. How do they tell the story? Do we believe them?

Readers need to feel like your narrator has the authority to tell these events in a way that satisfies them. If you want to share the thoughts and feelings of the characters, the narrator needs to sound like they are confident in the details they are sharing.

Third Person Objective Example

If you’re wondering how to show conflict when writing in the third person objective POV, we would recommend reading Hills Like White Elephants by Ernest Hemingway.

Let’s look at an excerpt from the story:

The woman brought two glasses of beer and two felt pads. She put the felt pads and the beer glasses on the table and looked at the man and the girl. The girl was looking off at the line of hills. They were white in the sun and the country was brown and dry. “They look like white elephants,” she said. “I’ve never seen one.” The man drank his beer. “No, you wouldn’t have.” “I might have,” the man said. “Just because you say I wouldn’t have doesn’t prove anything.” The girl looked at the bead curtain. “They’ve painted something on it,” she said. “What does it say?” “Anis del Toro. It’s a drink.”

As you can see from this extract, the third person objective narrator is relaying the information about the scene without being biased to either of the characters. They do not quote the characters’ thoughts or feelings; they simply give details about their actions and words.

As a reader, you can still imagine what the characters are thinking and feeling, as the conflict is laid out bare for you to witness.

Third Person Omniscient Example

Readers of the third person omniscient POV expect the narrator to be all-seeing and all-knowing, so it makes sense that the narrator in Good Omens by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett is “God” or the “Almighty.”

Here’s an extract from the novel:

“Er. Okay,” he said. “I’ll, er, be off then. Shall I? Get it over with. Not that I want to get it over with,” he added hurriedly, aware of the things that could happen if Hastur turned in an unfavourable report. “But you know me. Keen. So I’ll be popping along,” Cowley babbled. “See you guys... see you. Er. Great. Fine. Ciao.” As the Bentley skipped off into the darkness Ligur said, “Wossat mean?” “It’s Italian,” said Hastur. “I think it means food .” “Funny thing to say, then.” Ligur stared at the retreating tail-lights. “You trust him?” he said. “No,” said Hastur. “Right,” said Ligur. It’d be a funny old world, he reflected, if demons went round trusting one another.

This example shows how the third person omniscient narrator pops into the heads of several characters in one passage. At the beginning, we’re in Cowley’s mind, which is shown by the phrase “aware of things that could happen if Hastur turned in an unfavourable report.” However, within a few lines, we pop into Ligur’s mind, which is apparent in the sentence, “It’d be a funny old world, he reflected, if demons went round trusting one another.”

Third Person Limited Example

If you’re looking for examples of third person limited narrators that tell the story from one character’s perspective, we would recommend reading Happily Ever After by Harriet Evans.

Let’s check out a section of the novel:

She knew his face so well, knew him so well, how he drummed his fingers on any spare surface, how he looked vague when trying to get out of things, how his mouth curled to the side when he was making a joke. But she’d never sat this close to him before, because he was her boss. It didn’t feel like that tonight. It was as if they were different people. It was nice. Rory was nice, but then, she’d always known that.

Romance writers like writing first person POV, but third person limited also works well in this genre, like in this extract. The narrator is giving us a direct connection to the mind of the main character (Elle). They do this by describing everything Elle’s noticed about the man she’s attracted to.

Elle realizes her boss has always been nice and we get the impression she’s always secretly wanted to date him. The narrator shows us this by giving us Elle’s perspective on what’s happening in the scene. It’s as close as the narrator can be without Elle telling the story herself.

As you can see, writing in the third person isn’t hard when you follow the step-by-step process. It’s a lot of fun to experiment with the different types of third person POV. Which one do you prefer?

Don’t forget, if you’re worried about slipping into different POVs within your writing, you can always use the ProWritingAid pronoun report to keep you in check!

writing a book review in third person

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##About Sarah is a romance writer with a passion for studying human connections and psychology. She lives with her fiancé and two cats in Gloucester, UK. When she’s not writing, Sarah enjoys visiting theme parks, singing along to rock songs, and planning her next vacation. ##Writing Experience Sarah is an aspiring screenwriter who hopes to see her name in the credits of a romance film one day. She has also written short stories and has had many ideas for novels in a variety of genres. ##Education Sarah has been studying the art of writing and film from the age of 16 and she holds a BA in Creative Writing.

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For Authors

Writing in the Third-Person Perspective: A Guide

By: Ginger on January 17, 2020

writing a book review in third person

Over the last couple of weeks, we’ve published a couple of articles on first-person perspective in writing – which can be a fun and productive exercise even if you ultimately choose not to pursue that style of writing in your work. But there is more than one way to tell a story, and many authors prefer writing in the third-person perspective.  So today, Ginger is giving the details on writing in that style, and some of the common issues to keep in mind while doing so.

When I wrote my blog post Defending First-Person POV , I didn’t anticipate the number of people who disagreed with me – and while I might not share their opinion, they all made valid points – and I think it’s a point worth discussing.

For a start – don’t listen to me! If you want to write your story in third-person, go right ahead. I just think the first-person perspective is a powerful one; but only if it fits what you’re trying to say.

But just as the first-person perspective empowers a reader to enter the heart and soul of a character, the third-person perspective is a powerful “God’s eye view” of a story, and isn’t just a robustly serviceable style of narrative, but one that offers a flexibility to your storytelling that the first-person perspective can’t equal.

I claim the third!

One of the reasons the third-person perspective style of writing is so popular among authors is because it’s popular among authors – it’s the default style of writing, and anybody who interested in writing and publishing has probably had their narrative shaped by books written in this practically ubiquitous style.

I speak from experience. While I might write in the first-person perspective now, it was James Bond, and The Saint, and Jilly Cooper’s romances that shaped the stories I like to tell, and they were all written in third-person perspective.

As I got older, the fantasy books I used to love were similarly written from this perspective – and, arguably, the most influential movies of all time similarly reinforced this because you got to see things that the hero or heroine wouldn’t – such as how Luke Skywalker had no idea that Darth Vader was up on the Death Star choking out his minions in the first few minutes of his story, but we – the audience – got to see that delightful scene ourselves (“Your lack of faith is disturbing.”)

A lot of thrillers, murder mysteries, and other genres employ this because it offers a great way to add exposition to a story which would be difficult in first-person perspective, and it allows a lot of flexibility in ‘flow’. An example of that would be following one character into a room, recording an interaction, and then following the second character out of the room.

I’ve always called it a ‘God’s eye view’ because you can literally dip in and jump out of any character’s scene, at any time, anywhere in your story. Its like playing that video game The Sims , where you have an overhead view of all the characters, and can zoom in on whichever one is doing something interesting at the time.

However, while this approach offers a lot of flexibility – it also presents challenges. One of the reasons I like writing genre romance, and writing in first-person, and even penning poetry is because it has a format . Rules. You know what you can and can’t do with it, and to quote T.S. Eliot: “When forced to work within a strict framework the imagination is taxed to its utmost – and will produce its richest ideas. Given total freedom the work is likely to sprawl.”  

For years, I worked in the advertising industry, and one of my mentors showed me how the more defined a client’s request is, the easier it is to fulfill. He quoted the great David Ogilvy, who said: “Give me the freedom of a tight brief.”

But for a lot of writers, the appeal is the freedom – and that’s why they enjoy third-person perspective so much. There’s nothing wrong with that – in fact, freedom of expression should be celebrated – but from a reader’s perspective, here are some things to keep in mind:

The Story Comes First

If there’s been a reoccurring thread to my blogs in recent weeks, it’s that you need to ruthlessly divorce story from writing . The story is the sheet music, and the writing is the instrument you play it on. Great works of literature could be considered a philharmonic orchestra, while genre books could be considered ‘pop music’ because they have mass appeal, but ultimately you should be able to take the writing style of one and marry it to the story of the other and still have something worth reading.

So, just as I recommended with the first-person perspective, make sure you have your story buttoned up first. Stories should have a structure – I enjoy using the story circle to figure it out – and the events of the story shouldn’t change whether you write it in the third-person or first-person (in fact, I even warned that if your story DID shift in your mind when you swapped writing perspective, you should go back and reexamine it because your character’s motivation is probably a little off.)

The advantage of doing this is that you then have a ‘map’ of the story, and a map of what all the characters are doing throughout the story. Then you can dip in and write specific scenes about specific characters with a freedom you don’t have in first-person perspective.

I’d even go so far as to draw out a timeline of your story and actually highlight the journey of each of the characters – maybe drawing a line with a different colored pen. That way, you can see what order things happen in, and decide which characters you should focus on at different points in the story.

If you’re a pantster rather than a plotter, this suggestion might be a bit off-putting to you. If that’s the case – ignore it. Pantsters normally have a talent for sewing a parachute after they’ve thrown themselves into the first chapter, and with any luck they’ll have finished it by the time they reach the words THE END. However, as a reformed pantster, I’ll tell you that plotting a story is a REALLY powerful step and you should start experimenting with it more often. 

Watch for Transitions

As an editor, the most frequent problem I came across in other people’s books was when they shifted focusing on one character in a scene, and moved onto another character without so much as blinking.

I won’t take a real example, but this is a fairly close one from a book I edited recently:

Marcus walked into the room, and found Neil waiting for him.  He put his hands on his hips and snorted: “What are you doing here, Neil?”  He narrowed his eyes, balling his hands into fists.  “Leaving, actually.” With a snarl, he turned and strode out of the room. He couldn’t believe the cheek of that guy! Fortunately, Denise had her office just down the hall, so he strode down there to vent to her about his colleague.

Chances are, that might have read fine to you – but you might also have got hung up on the ‘he’ bit. When we started that scene we were following Marcus, and he put his hands on his hips. The next ‘he’ refers to Neil, though – and that’s who balls his hands in response, and then strides out of the room.

Without specifically calling them out by name, it’s difficult to know which ‘he’ is who, until you finish the sentence and gather context. If you think this is a valid complaint, just imagine an entire chapter written like this – with shifting perspectives from multiple characters, many of whom are referred to as simply ‘he’ for the majority of their bit.

There are various ways to address this. I like the method in which chapters are written using third-person perspective, but you only follow one character through that scene. If the perspective shifts, you shift chapters. This makes it clear who is being written about, but you can still pop in and out of different character journeys in a way you can’t if you’re writing your book from the first-person perspective of just one or two characters.

Another option is simply tighter editing – be sure to use names where you can, to clarify whether or not ‘he’ refers to Neil or Marcus. If that gets a bit repetitive (trust me, it will) you should come up with a consistent two-word descriptor for that character which is interchangeable (for example, ‘the steely eyed inspector.’) That way, you can make it clear.

Finally, you could have a section break – or just describe the shift better. For example, you could add a single line to the paragraph above which helps the reader ‘shift’ from Marcus to Neil:

Marcus walked into the room, and found Neil waiting for him.  He put his hands on his hips and snorted: “What are you doing here, Neil?”  Neil had been waiting for him for fifteen minutes, just to make a dramatic exit.  He narrowed his eyes, balling his hands into fists.  “Leaving, actually.”

That single line stops the reader in their tracks and forces them to think: “Oh, I see, we’re seeing things from Neil’s perspective now” and subsequently, the next few ‘he’ sentences are clearly referring to Neil.

It’s a straightforward approach, but very important. As I’ve said before, the essence of good writing and editing isn’t perfectionism, but flow. You want to make sure your writing is clear, and a reader can be immersed in it without anything throwing them back out into reality when they don’t ‘get it.’ That can be a typo, a misused word, or a scene in which it’s confusing which character is doing what.

Cut the Fluff

Using third-person perspective, you can dip in and out of any scene, at any point in the story, and present it to the reader – but before you do, you should ask WHY.

While there’s nothing wrong with longer books – heck, Stephen King has made a career of them – there has to be some meat to what you write. Chopping and changing and switching character perspectives is fine – as long as the scenes you include actually add to the story, either in terms of moving the plot forward, or providing characterization.

This is another reason why the first-person perspective is popular with romance genre authors – because their books are generally designed to be on the shorter side, and by writing from only the hero and heroine’s alternating perspectives, you only have to write about the events they witness, experience, or learn about. This means you can’t put in scenes that don’t fit those perspectives – for example, writers would have had to nix the scene of Darth Vader choking his subordinate if Star Wars was a romance novel (although given the onscreen kiss in Star Wars is between Luke and Leia, maybe it’s a good job Star Wars isn’t a romance novel.)

While you have more flexibility to follow other characters in a third-person perspective story, you have to be disciplined about whether you should . Switching perspectives can interrupt the pace of a book as it is, and if you indulge yourself by writing a scene that doesn’t really drive the story or enrich the characters – even if it’s really, really good – it might be a better idea to shelve it to preserve the pace and brevity of your novel.

Of course, if you’re anything like me, you can feel incredibly protective of some scenes you’ve written – and nixing them would be like cutting off a metaphorical finger. However, unless you can definitively define how the scene progresses the book, it doesn’t.

Again, this is where plotting comes in so handy. If you plan out your story as I described above, outlining the experiences of each character and how they intertwine, it’s easier to choose which scenes to include, which events to mention in passing, and what to leave unwritten. Look for scenes in which character threads overlap, or in which one character’s actions impact the lives of other characters. These are the clues that the scene is important to include. If in doubt, ask yourself: What about the plot won’t the reader understand if I do leave out the scene?

If the scene isn’t a supporting pillar for the story, or a rich tapestry of characterization, it’s just words on a page; and I usually remove them and store them in a separate document which I can then offer as bonus content to fans, or to cannibalize for cute turns of phrase or good description. Words don’t need to be wasted – either by including them unnecessarily in your manuscript, or by not saving them to repurpose them.

The third-party perspective is a very popular choice of writing and reading style, and not without good reason. While a lot of authors swear by it – especially over first-person perspective writing – it does come with some challenges to be aware of. Hopefully this blog covered some of the most important ones, and will help you hone your craft as you write in this point of view.

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Your second example with Marcus and Neil is still an error. You shouldn’t switch perspectives within the same scene. There should be no mention of the 15-minute wait. Marcus can’t know that, and his is the current POV. If there’s a break in the chapter, or if a new chapter has begun, then you can switch POVs to anyone. But you need to stay there.

A more subtle (and common) error would be if Marcus described Neil as “very angry.” Technically, that’s a POV switch, too. It should read, “plainly very angry.” Again, Marcus can’t know what’s in Neil’s mind, but can determine it from his face, actions, etc. So words like “clearly” and “obviously” are often necessary to reinforce the main POV when thinking about how another character feels.

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writing a book review in third person

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How To Write In Third Person

Feb 2, 2020

It is very easy to fall into the habit of first-person writing. However, third-person writing is a very important, and a fun and exciting perspective to write a story from! What is beneficial for one story may not be for the other. These steps will help you learn how to write in the third person point of view, which will open up brand new pathways for your writings that maybe you hadn’t considered before.

Many times, writers are way too focused on the story’s plot rather than what it has become. If you change the point of view of your story it can give you a fresh new perspective, many times opening up new pieces of creations, by coming up with new ideas, and making for bolder and more inner-directive fiction.

6 Steps To Help You Learn How To Write In Third Person

writing a book review in third person

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  • Citation Styles

How to write in third-person

How to write in third person

Although there are three narratives you can use in any form of writing when it comes to your papers and anything academic you produce, it’s best to choose the third-person. It’s pretty simple with a bit of practice, but if you’re completely new to this writing style, here’s what you need to know about how to write in third-person.

What does writing in third-person mean?

Writing in third-person is one of the three styles you can use when describing a point of view. Even though you might not know it, chances are you’ve used first, second and third person in writing projects throughout your education.

It’s a narrative where you’re totally independent of the subject you’re analyzing and writing about. You don’t take sides. You don’t try to influence what readers feel. It’s a completely unbiased, objective way of writing that tells a story or dissects a topic right down the middle.

There’s a lot of information out there about how you can differentiate between the three in roundabout ways, making it unnecessarily complicated. Here’s a quick breakdown to understand the differences for when you write your following paper:

First-person

This is from the I/we perspective. It’s where we talk about us , ourselves, and our opinions. If we go down the first-person route, writing will include pronouns like I , me , myself, and mine .

Second-person

This point of view belongs to the person you’re addressing — so its a you perspective. In your writing, you’d use second-person pronouns such as you , your, and yourselves .

Third-person

The third-person point of view is aimed at the person or people being talked about, which is the type of writing you’d find in stories. In this perspective, you’d use pronouns like he , she , him , her , his , hers , himself , herself , it , them , their, and themselves . Or, you’d use a name. But that tends to happen more in stories than research papers.

Notice the difference between the three?

When to write in third-person

The third-person point of view tells the reader a story and it’s often the go-to when you’re taking an authoritative stance in your papers, which is why it’s so common in academic writing.

So, always choose the third-person stance when writing academic copy, such as essays and research papers.

The reason for this is it’ll make your papers less personal and more objective, meaning the objectivity will make you come across as more credible and less biased. Ultimately, this will help your grades as the third-person view keeps you focused on evidence and facts instead of your opinion.

You can break third-person perspectives into three other types, including omniscient, limited, and objective. Although they’re more associated with creative writing than academic work and essays, your writing is likely to fall under the third-person objective point of view.

A third-person objective point of view is about being neutral and presenting your findings and research in an observational way, rather than influencing the reader with your opinions.

How to use the third-person point of view

Rule number one: Never refer to yourself in your essay in the third-person. That’s a no-no.

For instance, here’s how you shouldn’t write a sentence in your essay if you’re writing about virtual learning as an example.

“I feel like students perform better at home because they have more freedom and are more comfortable.”

It’s a simple sentence, but there’s a lot wrong with it when you’re talking about research papers and adopting a third-person narrative. Why? Because you’re using first-person pronouns and, as it sounds like an opinion, you can’t back up your claims with a stat or any credible research. There’s no substance to it whatsoever.

Also, it isn’t very assertive. The person marking your work won’t be impressed by “I feel like,” because it shows no authority and highlights that it came from your brain and not anywhere of note.

By including terms like “I think” or “I feel” like in the example above, you’re already off to a bad start.

But when you switch that example to the third-person point of view, you can cite your sources , which is precisely what you need to do in your essays and research papers to achieve higher grades.

Let’s switch that sentence up and expand it using the third-person point of view:

“A psychological study from Karrie Goodwin shows that students thrive in virtual classrooms as it offers flexibility. They can make their own hours and take regular breaks. Another study from high school teacher, Ashlee Trip, highlighted that children enjoy freedom, the ability to work at their own pace and decide what their day will look like.”

With a third-person narrative, you can present evidence to the reader and back up the claims you make. So, it not only shows what you know, but it also shows you took the time to research and strengthen your paper with credible resources and facts — not just opinions.

6 tips for writing in third-person

1. understand your voice won’t always shine in your essays.

Every single piece of writing tends to have a voice or point of view as if you’re speaking to the reader directly. However, that can’t always happen in academic writing as it’s objective compared to a novel, for example. Don’t try to ‘fluff’ up your piece to try and cram your personality in, as your academic work doesn’t need it.

2. Don’t focus on yourself or the reader — focus on the text

An academic piece of work always has a formal tone as it’s objective. When you write your next paper, focus on the writing itself rather than the writer or the reader.

3. Coach yourself out of using first-person pronouns

This is easier said than done if all you’ve ever done is first- or second-person writing. When you write your next paper, scan through it to see if you’ve written anything in first-person and replace it with the third-person narrative.

Here are a few regular offenders that pop up in academic papers — along with how you can switch the statements to third-person:

  • I argue should be this essay argues
  • I found that should be it was found that
  • We researched should be the group researched
  • I will also analyze should be topic X will also be analyzed

The same applies to second-person, as there are plenty of cases where it tends to slip through in academic writing. Again, it’s pretty straightforward to switch the more you practice. For instance:

  • Your paper will be marked higher if you use a citation tool should be the use of a citation tool will improve one’s grades

4. Be as specific as possible

This is where things can get a little bit confusing. Writing in third-person is all about including pronouns like he, she, it, and they. However, using them towards the beginning of sentences can be pretty vague and might even confuse the reader — this is the last thing you want from your essay or paper.

Instead, try using nouns towards the beginning of sentences. For example, use the actual subject, such as the interviewer or the writer, rather than he, she, or they when you begin the sentence.

The same applies to terms like it. Start the sentence with the ‘it’ is that you’re describing. If it’s a citation tool, begin the sentence by referencing what you’re discussing, so you aren’t vague. Clarity is key.

5. Write in the present tense when using third-person

In any form of academic writing, you need to write your reports, essays, and research papers in the present tense, especially when introducing different subjects or findings.

So, rather than saying “This paper analyzed” (which does seem correct as technically that part was in the past and the writing is in the present), you should write “This report analyzes” — as if you’re analyzing right here and now.

However, the difference is when you highlight how you did the research, that should be in the past tense. This means you’d use third-person phrases like “The equipment that was used” or “The results were analyzed by”, for instance.

6. Avoid adding your own thoughts

If your report is on a subject that’s close to your heart, it can be super tempting to sprinkle in your own thoughts. It’s a challenge, but you need to coach yourself out of it.

In academic writing, you aren’t a commentator. You’re a reporter. You need to let readers draw their conclusions without over-analyzing them or making the reader lean one way or another.

The easiest way to get to grips with writing your academic papers in the third-person is to be consistent and practice often. Criticize your work and analyze it until it becomes the norm. Yes, it can be a little complex in the early days, but before you know it, you’d have mastered the technique, helping you take your papers and reports up a level.

Frequently Asked Questions about writing in third-person

In third-person, you’d use pronouns like he , she , him , her , his , hers , himself , herself , it , them , their, and themselves . Or, you’d use a name.

You is used in second person and is therefore not used in third person. The second person is used for the person that is being addressed.

The third-person point of view is aimed at the person or people being talked about, which is the type of writing you’d find in stories. When writing in third-person view, make sure to write in the present tense and avoid adding your own thoughts.

When writing in third person, you should actually always write in the present tense since you are mostly presenting results in this view.

The second person point of view belongs to the person you’re addressing — so its a you perspective. In your writing, you’d use second-person pronouns such as you , your, and yourselves .

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Guides • Perfecting your Craft

Posted on Oct 27, 2020

Multiple Points of View: 7 Tips for Writing from Different Perspectives

Writing from multiple points of view has become increasingly popular in recent years. From Gone Girl to Game of Thrones to Normal People , using multiple viewpoint characters allows you to expand the scope of your story, giving readers additional insight into characters and plot points.

However, there are pitfalls to this approach as well. To help you balance multiple points of view and avoid POV overload, here are some important points to keep in mind when you want to tell a story from multiple perspectives. 

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Tip 1: The bigger the cast, the bigger the scope

By its very nature, a story with multiple points of view is going to be a “larger” story than one with only a single perspective. Not necessarily longer, but bigger in scope. Stories with multiple points of view deal usually deal with more character arcs, situations, and settings.

Multiple Points of View | Adding viewpoints widens the scope

The ability to broaden the scope is one reason why epic fantasies so often rely on multiple points of view. However, it applies just as much to quieter, more literary stories. Contrast Mary Beth Keane’s Ask Again, Yes with Ann Patchett’s The Dutch House. Both are family sagas that follow their characters across many decades; both are powerful and introspective stories that dive deep into the lives of their characters. However, the focus of The Dutch House is specifically about the protagonist. Consistently throughout his life, he feels isolated and alone, and his singular point of view backs up this sensation with its tight focus. Ask Again, Yes , by contrast, gives us scenes from multiple members of two families, and the world of the story feels like it takes up more space as a result.

Each author made a deliberate choice with their points of view that compliments the goals of the book as a whole. 

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Tip 2: Don’t add more points of view just for the sake it

Just because you want a story to feel larger, that doesn’t mean you want to include scenes from every character. We’ll get into how to choose your point of view characters in a moment, but before you decide that, you should consider how many you’re willing to include.

As a rule of thumb, you’ll probably want fewer POV characters than you think — especially if this is your first novel.  Each viewpoint character adds complexity to the story, as each viewpoint character now requires added depth and a satisfying character arc. The logistics can also get tangled quickly with multiple perspectives, so be careful! Be sure to develop each character's perspective, and progress their stories evenly to maintain consistency across the entire story.

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Yes, someone like George R.R. Martin can pull off a huge cast of point of view characters effectively — but he has years of experience, and even then, he still writes himself into corners sometimes. By all means, don’t be afraid of large POV casts, but know that you’re undertaking a lot more complexity. It’s not a decision to be made lightly. If you are going to use a large cast...

Maintain balance at all times

Adding more points of view also makes it harder for the reader to keep track of each person — especially if the characters spend their time in different places. Each additional character brings with them a whole new supporting cast and plot thread for readers to remember and stay emotionally invested in. Be sure to check in with each viewpoint character often enough that readers remember what's going on.

Whenever you’re deciding on point of view, ask yourself: is this person’s perspective necessary to understand the story? On that note…

Tip 3: Make your characters work for the spotlight

Characters always need to serve a purpose in your story — otherwise, why are they there? This same rule goes double for viewpoint characters. After all, nobody wants to spend time with a character who’s going to sit on the sidelines the whole book.

Whenever you’re considering adding another point of view character, ask yourself:

Does this character have a unique perspective?

Above all, viewpoint characters should be interesting . They’re the filter through which we’re going to experience the story, after all, so they’d better have something to offer! Readers won't enjoy spending time with a character who doesn’t react to the plot in unique and interesting ways.

Are they present during important moments in the plot?

Another way to decide on viewpoint characters is by simply looking at who’s around for important moments. Readers only see things when your viewpoint characters do — so you’re going to need to make sure they witness your best plot points.

More than simply picking a character who’ll be present , though, make sure you choose a character who will be impacted by the events they’re experiencing. Readers want active characters who make choices and drive the plot forward.

Do they know information other characters don’t?

If a piece of information is important for readers to know, a big consideration is which characters will have this information — and when they find out. Revealing information through your characters is a great way to make sure you show, don’t tell , what’s happening in your story.

The inverse is also important to consider: if you have a plot twist and you don’t want readers to know about it beforehand, make sure you’re not writing from the perspective of someone who would give it away!

Now that you know how to choose your point of view, let’s take a look at how to use multiple points of view effectively.

Tip 4: Keep ties between your viewpoint characters

While it’s true that each viewpoint character needs their own arc, don’t lose sight of the fact that they still belong to the same story.

Even if your characters don’t spend much time together, they should probably meet at least once. Regardless of how often they interact, though, make sure their story lines impact each other. It can be as subtle as a ripple effect or a counterbalance making a thematic point, but it should always be obvious to the reader why these characters are part of the same story. Otherwise, they'll be left wondering what the point was.

Tip 5: Every person has a unique voice, characters should too

When writing multiple points of view, clarity is everything. To that end, your reader should be able to flip ahead to a random page and quickly identify who is telling the story. How would they do that? Character voice.

If you’ve followed our advice and chosen characters who have a unique perspective, this should be fairly easy. Still, it’s important enough that it’s worth really nailing down the voice and worldview of each character.

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When crafting your viewpoint characters, make sure you…

Give each character their own vocabulary

An easy way to establish voice is to mix up your word choices. For example, if one character came from a prim and orderly background, they might have a more esoteric vocabulary than one who was raised on the streets. The first character could use sophisticated sentence structures and have a vocabulary that would make an SAT proctor proud. The second may speak in more direct sentences and use slang or shorthand phrases.

Infuse your character’s perspective into the scene

Remember how you chose your character based on their unique perspective? It’s time to make use of that!

As well as reacting to the plot in compelling ways, a viewpoint character should infuse their own impression on events. So if they’re a pessimist, the narrative from their point of view should reflect that. The same goes if they don’t like one of the other characters — the descriptions of that character aren’t exactly going to be flattering, are they?

Even the things they notice and describe should vary based on the point of view. Just think how differently the Sherlock Holmes books would read if they’d been written from Holmes’s perspective instead of Watson’s! All those little details that Watson doesn’t notice would suddenly get a great deal of description.

Tip 6: Only mix first person and third person for a reason

One way you can define a character’s voice is by telling one perspective in first person (“I, me, mine”), and the other in third person (“he, she, they”).

However, this approach should be done with care — if you decide to use it. Mixing first person and third person in the same story can be jarring or confusing to some readers, and it might prove harder for you to create a sense of consistency throughout the novel.

That said, some novels use this trick to great effect. Just ask yourself why you want to mix first person and third person. Consider:

  • How does it change the way readers experience the story from viewpoint to viewpoint?
  • Are you trying to create extra distance between the characters?
  • Is there information you need to hide, that wouldn’t reasonably be hidden in the first person?
  • Is one of the characters colder and more analytical than the other, and you want to highlight the difference?

These aren’t the only reasons you might want to mix perspectives, of course. Just make sure your decision is intentional and moves the story forward effectively. As long as you’re not mixing it up for the sake of mixing it up, you should be okay.

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Tip 7: Don’t hide when you change points of view

One of the most important rules of writing is Don’t Confuse the Reader. When writing multiple points of view, remember that readers aren’t psychic — they won’t know you’re changing viewpoint characters unless you tell them. There are two easy and effective ways to do this.

Change POVs at the start of each chapter

Make sure you let readers know immediately that the perspective has changed. The simplest way to do this is by labelling the start of each chapter like in  A Game of Thrones , where the table of contents reads like a character list.

Establish your new POV character quickly at the start of each scene

If changing points of view at a chapter break doesn't fit with your plot structure, you can also do it at a scene break. Just be sure to use the first sentence to immediately establish the new viewpoint through the setting, distinct voice, and which characters are present. Something like:

As soon as Henry stepped onto the train, he knew he’d made a right ol’ mistake.
Abby couldn’t believe she’d been so ready to accept what Michael had told her.

Whatever you do, don’t change the point of view in the middle of a scene. This is known as “head hopping” and it’s incredibly jarring and difficult to follow. So if we’re being taken through the scene from Tony’s perspective, don’t suddenly start describing things from Joan’s instead.

Remember, all of writing is an art — but that doesn’t mean there aren’t guidelines to make the process easier. Writing from multiple points of view is a challenging but rewarding task. The next time you sit down to write, ask yourself: how would it change the story to add another viewpoint? How would it change to remove one? Don’t be afraid to experiment! We can’t wait to see what you come up with.

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Jane Friedman

ONLINE CLASS

Write powerfully in deep third pov, drive readers deep into the heart of your character’s experience.

Tiffany Yates Martin

Live on July 12, or watch recording

Novelists who are new to deep third POV

ACCESSIBILITY

Closed captions by Otter; transcript provided with recording

Deep third-person point of view (POV)—also known as “close third”—is a narrative technique that combines elements of both limited-third and first-person perspectives. It offers a unique way of storytelling that can greatly enhance the reader’s immersion in a story, which has made it increasingly popular in the current market.

Compared to omniscient POV and limited-third person POV, deep third offers more intimacy and immediacy, or a closer connection between reader and character. The author can delve deep into a character’s thoughts, emotions, and perspective with this unique POV.

However, using deep third effectively requires skill and attention. It demands an exceptionally thorough understanding and development of your POV character(s), and a secure grounding in their history and background, relationships, motivations and goals, personality, and more to give readers the intimate, direct experience that this POV can offer. Mastering deep third requires a careful and deliberate handling of perspective.

Another challenge is avoiding excessive navel-gazing or prolonged interiority that can slow down the momentum of the story. Authors must maintain a balance between introspection and action, ensuring that the narrative remains engaging and dynamic.

In this 90-minute webinar, career editor Tiffany Yates Martin will show you what sets deep third apart from other points of view, how to most effectively use its power, and what it looks like to drive readers deep into a character’s direct experience. We’ll look at plentiful examples to see what makes deep third work, to open a window into your characters’ direct experience while serving the story and moving it forward.

You will learn:

  • The difference between “deep third” and omniscient and limited-third person POVs, and how to achieve the perfect mix of third-person voice with first-person intimacy
  • The main characteristics of stories told in deep third POV
  • Pros and cons of using deep third
  • When and how much to use elements of deep third
  • Showing versus telling
  • Character perspective and personality
  • Dialogue and nonverbals
  • Sensory detail
  • Avoiding filtering language
  • Avoiding POV slips

By the end of class, you’ll possess the knowledge and skills to effectively deploy deep third POV and create a stronger connection between reader and character.

Afterward, all students will receive supplementary PDF handouts on deep third POV.

Who this class is for

  • Novelists who are curious about deep third POV and want to learn more about incorporating this powerful, intimate POV into their stories
  • Authors writing fiction who struggle with creating and maintaining strong, consistent deep third POV
  • Authors who may have resisted using deep third POV who want to know more about what it can offer their stories

This class is not suited for

  • Nonfiction writers, including memoirists. While some principles may apply to those writing narrative nonfiction, this class cannot address the unique issues facing nonfiction writers trying to put themselves in the heads of real people, whether dead or alive. Questions about nonfiction will not be answered during class.
  • Short story writers (there may be some benefit, but examples and assumptions will be novel driven)
  • Children’s picture book writers

What’s included in all of Jane’s classes

Satisfaction guarantee.

Get a refund if your expectations are not met.

A valuable webinar for one person can be a disappointment for another. For this reason, we offer full refunds if you register, attend or watch the class, and fail to get the information you were looking for.

In after-class surveys, 99% of our students say their expectations were met or exceeded.

Recording and transcript

You can attend live or wait for the recording.

Everyone who registers will get access to the recording, including:

  • Both video and audio files
  • Automated transcript
  • Slide presentation (PDF)

Recordings are typically ready within 3 business days.

Get your questions answered live or in writing.

We welcome your questions, and all classes include time for Q&A during the live event. If we can’t answer all questions during class, they will be addressed in writing.

All students receive a Q&A file with the recording.

How do I attend the live class?

This class uses Zoom webinar technology ( see system requirements ). You will join through your Internet-connected computer or mobile device. When you register, you will receive information via email on how to join the class. If you don’t receive it within 1 hour of registering, please contact us .

  • When: Wednesday, July 12, 2023
  • Time: 1:00–2:30 p.m. Eastern / 10:00 a.m. Pacific

The webinar is broadcast via the internet with live audio delivered through your computer or mobile device speakers. The visual presentation is displayed directly from the presenter’s computer to your computer screen. The Q&A is managed through a chat-style submission system with questions read and answered by the presenter for the entire class to hear.

Closed captions are provided during the live class.  We use Zoom ’s automated closed caption service (powered by Otter), which is about 80%+ accurate. We also use Otter AI to generate an unedited transcript, provided with the recording.

About the instructor

Tiffany Yates Martin  has spent nearly thirty years as an editor in the publishing industry, working with major publishers and New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, and USA Today bestselling and award-winning authors as well as indie authors and developing writers. She is the founder of FoxPrint Editorial and author of Intuitive Editing: A Creative and Practical Guide to Revising Your Writing . She is a regular contributor to writers’ outlets like Writer’s Digest, Jane Friedman, and Writer Unboxed, and a frequent presenter and keynote speaker for writers’ organizations around the country. Visit her at  www.foxprinteditorial.com .

Well planned and organized; good program support. Tiffany offered depth of knowledge and professional experience. Well worth the fee and time! Looking forward to the follow-up materials.

Love the specific example passages and always lean in to Tiffany’s running commentary, which inspires deeper insight.

Margaret Ludlam

There was so much wonderful information. I’m so glad it was recorded because I’m anxious to see it again, slow it down, check out the examples and resources and understand it even better. These classes are a must for writers!

Barbara Galvin

All students receive the following

  • Access to the live class.  After roughly 75 minutes, the instructor will take questions during class using in-class chat/text. The class will end after roughly 90 minutes.
  • A recording of the class—audio and video.  This is especially helpful if you have a conflict with the class time or something comes up and you can’t make the session. Each registration comes with access to the archived version of the program and the materials for 30 days. You do not have to attend the live event to access the recordings.
  • Presentation slides.  All participants receive a copy of the slide presentation in PDF form.
  • Rough transcript.  We use Otter to create an automated transcript of the entire webinar, which we’ll share with you in addition to the audio and video recording.
  • Supplementary handouts. You’ll receive handouts on deep third POV that summarize takeaways from the live presentation.

Event Attendance & Anti-Harassment Policy

We strive to provide an environment where all present—whether attendee, presenter, or staff—can feel supported. In order to ensure a welcoming event, here is what we expect from all who participate.

  • That the presenter and the presenter’s work be treated with respect by attendees and that all attendees treat each other with respect and a generosity of spirit.
  • That attendees will refrain from harassment of any sort including (but not limited to) comments or questions of a racist, homophobic, sexist/sexual, or threatening nature. This includes actions that disrupt or interfere with anyone’s ability to participate. Offenders will be disconnected from the live event.

Selfpublished Whiz

Writing in Third Person: How to, When to, and Why

When it comes to writing, the third person is one of the most commonly used points of view. This point of view allows readers to get inside the heads of multiple characters and can make stories more immersive and engaging.

But, how do you write third person? When should you use the third person instead of the first or second? We will answer all of those questions in this blog post and more!

Writing In Third Person: How To, When To, And Why

What Is Writing In Third Person?

How to write in third person about yourself, when should you write in third person, how to write in third person omniscient, why do authors write in third person, are biographies written in third person.

Writing in the third person point of view is when the writer tells the story using third-person pronouns like "he" or "she".

It gives the story a more objective perspective and can be less confusing for the reader.

When done well, it can make the story more engaging by giving the reader a different perspective on the events.

However, some people struggle to write in the third person, as they have to keep track of the thoughts and actions of all the different characters in the story.

This may not sound like a difficult task; however, you need to once you decide to write in third person, you need to remain consistent throughout the entire story.

Amazon Kdp Matte Vs Glossy: Which Should You Choose And Why?

When writing about yourself in the third person, it's important to maintain a consistent point of view. You don't want to switch back and forth between the first and third person within the same sentence or paragraph.

To stay in the third person, use pronouns like "he," "she," and "it," and avoid using words like "I" and "me." For example, you might write, "She went for a run this morning" instead of "I went for a run this morning."

It can be helpful to think of yourself as if you're someone else observing yourself from the outside. This will help you stay in the third person when describing your own actions and thoughts.

When Should You Write In Third Person?

Now that you know how to write in third person point of view, when should you use third person?

The third person point of view is most commonly used in fiction writing, but it can also be used when writing non-fiction or even when writing about yourself.

If you're not sure whether or not to write in third person, consider these three factors:

- Who is your audience?

- What tone do you want to set?

- What point of view will best suit your story?

If you're writing for a professional or academic audience, third person is often the best choice. It can help you sound more objective and less biased.

If you're writing a more personal piece, such as a memoir, you might want to consider writing in a first-person point of view. This will allow you to share your personal thoughts and experiences more directly with the reader.

When it comes to setting a tone, third person can be either formal or informal. It all depends on how you use pronouns and other third-person words.

For example, using third-person pronouns like "they," "them," and "their" can make your writing sound more objective.

On the other hand, using third-person pronouns like "he," "she," and "him" can make your writing sound more personal.

Ultimately, the best point of view for your story will be the one that allows you to tell your story most effectively.

There are a few things to keep in mind when writing in third person omniscient point of view. First, you need to know everything about your story and all of its characters.

This can be difficult to do if you haven’t planned everything out ahead of time. It’s important to have a clear understanding of the plot and all of the motivations for each character before beginning to write. 

Second, while it is called “third-person omniscient,” this doesn’t mean that the narrator knows everything about every character.

The narrator can only know what each individual character knows. This is important to remember when writing dialogue and internal thoughts for each character. What one character knows will be different from what another character knows. 

Many authors choose to write in third person point of view because it gives them a greater sense of objectivity. When an author writes in first person, they can only relate events that they personally experienced or witnessed.

However, when an author writes in third person, they can include events that took place outside of their own experience.

This can be particularly useful for historical fiction or other genres that rely heavily on research. In addition, third person point of view can help to create a more omniscient narrator, which can be beneficial for certain types of stories.

Finally, some authors simply find it easier to write in third person point of view because it allows them to distance themselves from their characters.

Whatever the reason, it is clear that there are many advantages to writing in a third person point of view.

Are Biographies Written In Third Person?

Yes. A biography is written in third person to provide a more objective and detached perspective of the subject. It allows readers to get a more holistic understanding of the person's life without being filtered through the subjective lens of the author.

Third person point of view can be helpful for biographers because it allows them to explore different aspects of their subject's life without becoming emotionally attached or invested in one particular perspective.

It also provides a broader scope for storytelling, as opposed to first or second person which tend to be more limited in focus.

An autobiography, on the other hand, is usually written from a first-person point of view. This is because an autobiography is typically more personal and intimate than a biography.

The author wants readers to feel as though they are getting to know them on a personal level, and third-person would not allow for that same level of connection.

However, there are exceptions to every rule. If an author feels more comfortable or believes that their story will be better served by writing in third person, then they are certainly free to do so.

There is no hard and fast rule that says biographies must be written in the third person and autobiographies must be written in the first person. It ultimately comes down to the author's preference.

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How to Write in Third Person

Last Updated: February 19, 2024 Fact Checked

This article was co-authored by Alicia Cook . Alicia Cook is a Professional Writer based in Newark, New Jersey. With over 12 years of experience, Alicia specializes in poetry and uses her platform to advocate for families affected by addiction and to fight for breaking the stigma against addiction and mental illness. She holds a BA in English and Journalism from Georgian Court University and an MBA from Saint Peter’s University. Alicia is a bestselling poet with Andrews McMeel Publishing and her work has been featured in numerous media outlets including the NY Post, CNN, USA Today, the HuffPost, the LA Times, American Songwriter Magazine, and Bustle. She was named by Teen Vogue as one of the 10 social media poets to know and her poetry mixtape, “Stuff I’ve Been Feeling Lately” was a finalist in the 2016 Goodreads Choice Awards. There are 7 references cited in this article, which can be found at the bottom of the page. This article has been fact-checked, ensuring the accuracy of any cited facts and confirming the authority of its sources. This article has been viewed 1,121,643 times.

Writing in third person can be a simple task, with a little practice. For academic purposes, third person writing means that the writer must avoid using subjective pronouns like “I” or “you.” For creative writing purposes, there are differences between third person omniscient, limited, objective, and episodically limited points of view. Choose which one fits your writing project.

Writing in Third Person Academically

Step 1 Use third person for all academic writing.

  • Third person helps the writing stay focused on facts and evidence instead of personal opinion.

Step 2 Use the correct pronouns.

  • Third person pronouns include: he, she, it; his, her, its; him, her, it; himself, herself, itself; they; them; their; themselves.
  • Names of other people are also considered appropriate for third person use.
  • Example: “ Smith believes differently. According to his research, earlier claims on the subject are incorrect.”

Step 3 Avoid first person pronouns.

  • First person pronouns include: I, me, my, mine, myself, we, us, our, ours, ourselves. [3] X Research source
  • The problem with first person is that, academically speaking, it sounds too personalized and too subjective. In other words, it may be difficult to convince the reader that the views and ideas being expressed are unbiased and untainted by personal feelings. Many times, when using first person in academic writing, people use phrases like "I think," "I believe," or "in my opinion."
  • Incorrect example: “Even though Smith thinks this way, I think his argument is incorrect.”
  • Correct example: “Even though Smith thinks this way, others in the field disagree.”

Step 4 Avoid second person pronouns.

  • Second person pronouns include: you, your, yours, yourself. [4] X Research source
  • One main problem with second person is that it can sound accusatory. It runs to risk of placing too much responsibility on the shoulders of the reader specifically and presently reading the work.
  • Incorrect example: “If you still disagree nowadays, then you must be ignorant of the facts.”
  • Correct example: “Someone who still disagrees nowadays must be ignorant of the facts.”

Step 5 Refer to the subject in general terms.

  • Indefinite third person nouns common to academic writing include: the writer, the reader, individuals, students, a student, an instructor, people, a person, a woman, a man, a child, researchers, scientists, writers, experts.
  • Example: “In spite of the challenges involved, researchers still persist in their claims.”
  • Indefinite third person pronouns include: one, anyone, everyone, someone, no one, another, any, each, either, everybody, neither, nobody, other, anybody, somebody, everything, someone.
  • Incorrect example: "You might be tempted to agree without all the facts."
  • Correct example: “ One might be tempted to agree without all the facts.”
  • This is usually done in an attempt to avoid the gender-specific “he” and “she” pronouns. The mistake here would be to use the “they” pronoun with singular conjugation. [5] X Research source
  • Incorrect example: “The witness wanted to offer anonymous testimony. They was afraid of getting hurt if their name was spread.”
  • Correct example: “The witness wanted to offer anonymous testimony. They were afraid of getting hurt if their name was spread.”

Writing in Third Person Omniscient

Step 1 Shift your focus from character to character.

  • For instance, a story may include four major characters: William, Bob, Erika, and Samantha. At various points throughout the story, the thoughts and actions of each character should be portrayed. These thoughts can occur within the same chapter or block of narration.
  • Writers of omniscient narratives should be conscious of “head-hopping” — that is, shifting character perspectives within a scene. While this does not technically break the rules of Third Person Omniscience, it is widely considered a hallmark of narrative laziness.

Alicia Cook

  • In a sense, the writer of a third person omniscient story is somewhat like the “god” of that story. The writer can observe the external actions of any character at any time, but unlike a limited human observer, the writer can also peek into the inner workings of that character at will, as well.
  • Know when to hold back. Even though a writer can reveal any information they choose to reveal, it may be more beneficial to reveal some things gradually. For instance, if one character is supposed to have a mysterious aura, it would be wise to limit access to that character's inner feelings for a while before revealing his or her true motives.

Step 3 Avoid use of the first person and second person pronouns.

  • Do not use first person and second person points of view in the narrative or descriptive portions of the text.
  • Correct example: Bob said to Erika, “I think this is creepy. What do you think?”
  • Incorrect example: I thought this was creepy, and Bob and Erika thought so, too. What do you think?

Writing in Third Person Limited

Step 1 Pick a single character to follow.

  • The thoughts and feelings of other characters remain an unknown for the writer throughout the duration of the text. There should be no switching back and forth between characters for this specific type of narrative viewpoint.
  • Unlike first person, where the narrator and protagonist are the same, third person limited puts a critical sliver of distance between protagonist and narrator. The writer has the choice to describe one main character’s nasty habit — something they wouldn’t readily reveal if the narration were left entirely to them.

Step 2 Refer to the character's actions and thoughts from the outside.

  • In other words, do not use first person pronouns like “I,” “me,” “my,” “we,” or “our” outside of dialog. The main character's thoughts and feelings are transparent to the writer, but that character should not double as a narrator.
  • Correct example: “Tiffany felt awful after the argument with her boyfriend.”
  • Correct example: “Tiffany thought, “I feel awful after that argument with my boyfriend.”
  • Incorrect example: “I felt awful after the argument with my boyfriend.”

Step 3 Focus on other characters' actions and words, not their thoughts or feelings.

  • Note that the writer can offer insight or guesses regarding the thoughts of other characters, but those guesses must be presented through the perspective of the main character.
  • Correct example: “Tiffany felt awful, but judging by the expression on Carl's face, she imagined that he felt just as bad if not worse.”
  • Incorrect example: “Tiffany felt awful. What she didn't know was that Carl felt even worse.”

Step 4 Do not reveal any information your main character would not know.

  • Correct example: “Tiffany watched from the window as Carl walked up to her house and rang the doorbell.”
  • Incorrect example: “As soon as Tiffany left the room, Carl let out a sigh of relief.”

Writing in Episodically Limited Third Person

Step 1 Jump from character to character.

  • Limit the amount of pov characters you include. You don't want to have too many characters that confuse your reader or serve no purpose. Each pov character should have a specific purpose for having a unique point of view. Ask yourself what each pov character contributes to the story.
  • For instance, in a romance story following two main characters, Kevin and Felicia, the writer may opt to explain the inner workings of both characters at different moments in the story.
  • One character may receive more attention than any other, but all main characters being followed should receive attention at some point in the story.

Step 2 Only focus on one character's thoughts and perspective at a time.

  • Multiple perspectives should not appear within the same narrative space. When one character's perspective ends, another character's can begin. The two perspectives should not be intermixed within the same space.
  • Incorrect example: “Kevin felt completely enamored of Felicia from the moment he met her. Felicia, on the other hand, had difficulty trusting Kevin.”

Step 3 Aim for smooth transitions.

  • In a novel-length work, a good time to switch perspective is at the start of a new chapter or at a chapter break.
  • The writer should also identify the character whose perspective is being followed at the start of the section, preferably in the first sentence. Otherwise, the reader may waste too much energy guessing.
  • Correct example: “Felicia hated to admit it, but the roses Kevin left on her doorstep were a pleasant surprise.”
  • Incorrect example: “The roses left on the doorstep seemed like a nice touch.”

Step 4 Understand who knows what.

  • For instance, if Kevin had a talk with Felicia's best friend about Felicia's feelings for him, Felicia herself would have no way of knowing what was said unless she witnessed the conversation or heard about it from either Kevin or her friend.

Writing in Third Person Objective

Step 1 Follow the actions of many characters.

  • There does not need to be a single main character to focus on. The writer can switch between characters, following different characters throughout the course of the narrative, as often as needed.
  • Stay away from first person terms like “I” and second person terms like “you” in the narrative, though. Only use first and second person within dialog.

Step 2 Do not attempt to get into directly into a character's head.

  • Imagine that you are an invisible bystander observing the actions and dialog of the characters in your story. You are not omniscient, so you do not have access to any character's inner thoughts and feelings. You only have access to each character's actions.
  • Correct example: “After class, Graham hurriedly left the room and rushed back to his dorm room.”
  • Incorrect example: “After class, Graham raced from the room and rushed back to his dorm room. The lecture had made him so angry that he felt as though he might snap at the next person he met.”

Step 3 Show but don't tell.

  • Correct example: “When no one else was watching her, Isabelle began to cry.”
  • Incorrect example: “Isabelle was too prideful to cry in front of other people, but she felt completely broken-hearted and began crying once she was alone.”

Step 4 Avoid inserting your own thoughts.

  • Let the reader draw his or her own conclusions. Present the actions of the character without analyzing them or explaining how those actions should be viewed.
  • Correct example: “Yolanda looked over her shoulder three times before sitting down.”
  • Incorrect example: “It might seem like a strange action, but Yolanda looked over her shoulder three times before sitting down. This compulsive habit is an indication of her paranoid state of mind.”

Examples of Third Person POV

writing a book review in third person

Expert Q&A

Alicia Cook

You Might Also Like

Write in Third Person Omniscient

  • ↑ https://stlcc.edu/student-support/academic-success-and-tutoring/writing-center/writing-resources/point-of-view-in-academic-writing.aspx
  • ↑ http://studysupportresources.port.ac.uk/Writing%20in%20the%20third%20peson.pdf
  • ↑ http://www.grammar-monster.com/glossary/third_person.htm
  • ↑ https://www.grammarly.com/blog/use-the-singular-they/
  • ↑ Alicia Cook. Professional Writer. Expert Interview. 11 December 2020.
  • ↑ https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/point-of-view-first-second-third-person-difference
  • ↑ https://ojs.library.dal.ca/YAHS/article/viewFile/7236/6278

About This Article

Alicia Cook

To write in third person, refer to people or characters by name or use third person pronouns like he, she, it; his, her, its; him, her, it; himself, herself, itself; they; them; their; and themselves. Avoid first and second person pronouns completely. For academic writing, focus on a general viewpoint rather than a specific person's to keep things in third person. In other types of writing, you can write in third person by shifting your focus from character to character or by focusing on a single character. To learn more from our Literary Studies Ph.D., like the differences between third person omniscient and third person limited writing, keep reading the article! Did this summary help you? Yes No

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Letter Review

Are Book Reviews Written in First Person?

writing a book review in third person

Writing book reviews is a fun and simple way to practice your writing and get your writing published for people to read and engage with. Despite the simplicity of a book review, it’s only effective if you nail the perspective and tone.

Book reviews are not written in first person. Though some book reviews are written in the first person, this perspective is suited to a more casual and relaxed tone. A professional book review should be written in the third person and voice opinions in a straightforward and well-informed way.

This article will tell you everything you need to know about perspective and tone in book reviews to take you from novice to pro in no time.

writing a book review in third person

Narrative Perspectives Used in Book Reviews

Before a writer types a single word, they’ve already made choices about their text. One of these choices is what narrative perspective they’re going to use. 

There are three main categories of perspective, namely:

  • First-person uses the pronouns “I,” “me,” “my,” and “we.” This perspective situates you, the narrator , as the “main character.” The first-person perspective is the most informal and is often used in novels, blog posts, and casual book reviews. 
  • The second person uses “you” and “your.” Picture this as the narrator talking to themselves in a mirror or giving instructions to a friend over the phone. This is the least commonly used narrative perspective. 
  • The third person uses pronouns like “they,” “them,” “she,” and “his,” as if talking about someone that isn’t included in the conversation. This is the most authoritative perspective. 

When assessing any piece of writing, context and a writer’s choice of narrative perspective is crucial. Every choice a writer makes is made intentionally to communicate something to their audience.

The third person is the ideal perspective to use when you’re writing a review for several reasons. While this isn’t a universal law that every reviewer abides by, it’s a highly prevalent pattern with its purposes. 

For practical examples of the differences between narrative perspectives, read through Grammarly Blog ’s article. 

Why You Should Review Books in the Third Person

Sometimes, reviewers use the first-person perspective in their reviews, but the context is essential. This makes sense if someone is writing a book review for entertainment or just starting out writing casual reviews for their own enjoyment.

When it comes to professional reviews, they’re almost always in the third person, as this creates just enough distance between the writer’s opinion and the facts presented in the book and the review. 

At the end of the day, book reviews are opinion pieces, but how that opinion is presented is just as important as the opinion itself.

People aren’t reading a book to learn whether the reviewer thought the main character wasn’t relatable to them or that they didn’t like how long it was. People read reviews to know whether they should read the book and what to expect.

A book reviewer’s job is to analyze the book’s strengths and weaknesses and judge whether the author achieved what they wanted by writing the book. 

The New York Times has a page dedicated to the latest book reviews from the best reviewers in the game, so you know where to go if you need some inspiration. 

How To Write in the Third Person

There are a few ways to better understand and improve your use of third-person perspectives. The first is knowing that there are three kinds of third-person perspectives:

  • Third person limited is not the protagonist’s voice but speaks from their perspective and only sees and knows the things the protagonist does. 
  • Third-person omniscient uses information about every character and event at any given time, regardless of whether or not the protagonist is aware of what’s happening. 
  • The third-person objective is the perspective you should use in a book review. The writer is outside, looking in and presenting what they see. 

Even if you don’t use the other narrative perspectives for book reviews, it’s essential to know the relationships between them to distinguish which to use in what situations and, more importantly, why certain ones better fit specific conditions. 

Be Consistent With Your Third Person Perspective

Once you’ve landed the correct perspective for your review, you must remember it while writing. It’s easy to get carried away with writing and switch perspectives without even realizing it, and while this can be used to further a story, it doesn’t suit a book review.

writing a book review in third person

Once you begin writing in the third person objective, stick to that throughout the article and only break into another perspective, such as the first person, in a way that makes sense. 

Write Confidently and Let Your Voice Show Through

Finally, writing in the third person comes with a greater sense of authority than the other perspectives, something you need to use to your advantage. Write confidently, and ensure that your unique voice comes through in your review while sticking to the facts. 

Ensure that you use firm and authoritative language throughout your review. 

This is more natural with third-person writing, as first-person reviews can end up with lines like “I think” or “I felt like.”

Third-person writing should avoid doubtful language and use lines like “this author succeeded in” or “the book fails to portray.” Remember, this review could be someone’s first impression of the book, so be unbiased and direct. 

Tips for Writing Book Reviews

Anyone can write a good book review with the right tools . Other than remaining consistent with a third-person perspective, there are several factors to consider while writing your review.

Some essential tools that will help you elevate your review-writing skills are:

  • Read book reviews: “Watch and learn” is a valuable moniker for writing book reviews. The more you read , the more you can pick up on patterns and conventions in tone, language use, and format. Reading makes better writing. 
  • Follow a format: Stick to a standard book review format, which will help you develop a unique voice and prepare you for the conventions you’ll need to follow when publishing a serious book review. 
  • Develop a voice: Despite following a format, you must ensure that your writing isn’t bland. Let your personality and style shine through in everything you write, amateur or professional. 
  • Remain firm and objective: The point of a book review is to determine if a book achieved what the author created it to, so that’s what you need to focus on. Discuss what you liked and disliked about it, based on the author’s intentions. 
  • Be fair and reasonable: Try to avoid becoming too opinionated, and remain professional and fair when passing judgment on someone’s writing, which will make your reviews more reputable.

While it’s possible to write book reviews in the first person, the third person narrative perspective innately has a more authoritative and professional tone, which is ideally what every reputable book reviewer should embody in their work.

writing a book review in third person

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Chip MacGregor

February 26, 2013

Should I use first-person or third-person in my novel?

by Chip MacGregor

Someone asked,  “In your opinion, is it better to see first-person or third-person POV novels for a first-time novelist?”


I’m not one who gets too worked up about first-or-third POV as the “answer” to great fiction. A good novelist can use either one. However, I can tell you from experience that many first-person novels from beginning writers suffer from an overuse of the “I-verb” syndrome. (“I started… I walked… I ate… I moved… I handed… I answered…”) That endless parade of I-verbs creates a really dull novel. First-person fiction can be great, and it’s certainly become much more common in recent years, but in my view it’s harder to master than third person.  


On a related note, someone asked,  “Is it true most publishers don’t want first-person novels?”


No, I don’t think that’s true at all. Again, writing an excellent first-person novel is simply harder to do well, so publishers probably have set the bar a bit higher. But some of the best fiction on the market is done in first person, and publishers still buy first-person novels. (Two favorite authors of mine, Ross Thomas and John D. MacDonald, wrote nearly everything from the first-person point of view.  Bridget Jones Diary  was a wildly successful first-person novel. I could give a bunch of other examples.)

One author sent in this:  “How many POV’s should a new novelist have in women’s contemporary fiction? I’ve heard we should use two for romance and one or two for general fiction. (I’m asking because my work in progress has one main character, but three other storylines that each require chapters from their POV. I’m wondering if that will make my novel harder to sell.)”


Interesting question, since it seems to suggest there are hard and fast rules to be followed in contemporary fiction. While there are certainly rules to follow in genre literature (for example, if you’re writing contemporary romance, you’ve got to have your heroine meet her hero early; if you’re writing a cozy mystery, the crime needs to take place early in the novel; etc.), in general fiction you don’t have all those same strictures. I’ve read contemporary fiction that had several POV’s working. However, let’s get real:  The more POV’s in the novel, the harder it is to make it work.  In my view, it will take an experienced hand to craft a great novel with multiple points of view. Having four POV’s in one novel might be a lot to ask a new novelist to do. So, yeah, in the big picture, that might make your novel harder to sell. That doesn’t mean I think you should give up on the idea (I haven’t seen your work, so I have no idea how well you handle it), it just means you should be aware that you’ve given yourself a tough task.

Another wrote to ask,  “At the beginning of many novels, I see the author often state ‘this is a work of fiction, and any similarities to real events is coincidental.’ Since writers don’t live in a vacuum, and often write about what they know, how important is this disclaimer? If I write about the donut shop in my hometown, am I in danger of being sued?”


You ever watch “Law and Order” on TV? At the beginning of every episode, they offer a warning that the story you’re about to see is a work of fiction, and any similarities to persons or events in the real world is strictly coincidental. The writers are clearly inspired by what they see in the newspaper headlines, but they take some basic plot ideas and weave a completely fictional story around them. If they simply stole someone else’s ideas, they would be violating the individual’s right to privacy, as well as possibly infringing on another’s copyright. Your novel has the same limitations. We’ve all written stories with people or places or events that had some connection to our past, and you’re free to include places and events that are genuine and bring a dose of reality to your book. But if you were to interview your friend, steal her story, and create a novelized account of her life, you would be in violation of the law. You need her expressed permission to tell her personal story. Instead you take that character and you reshape it a bit. You make sure not to slander anyone, or make a real person look bad. You change the details so that nobody could explore your story and know immediately who you were talking about. (I’m not a lawyer, so I’m not giving legal advice here, but I’ve had more than one lawyer explain the argument of reasonability in novels — i.e., If a reasonable person were to read the story, would they know who you were talking about? And would they assume you were trying to assassinate that individual’s character?) I doubt the donut shop is going to sue you, since you’re free to include such details in your novel. But I’d stay away from using the real names of the owners, and having them poison customers with cyanide-laced donuts. I’ve heard that’s the sort of thing donut-shop owners frown upon.

One author noted,  “I just read a nonfiction book that would make a fantastic novel. Must I contact the author to tell him I intend to dramatize the story? Or because it is a national story and a true event, do I not need to contact anyone? Can I simply consider the work reference material?”

You’re on dangerous ground here, so again let me begin by saying I’m not a lawyer, and I’m not giving legal advice. If you need legal help, by all means consult an attorney. I asked a lawyer informally about this question, and he said a writer should be aware of the source of his or her information. If the nonfiction book is basically your complete source for the novel you’re planning, then yes, you are legally obligated to talk with the author about your novel idea. But if this is, as you say, a national story that everyone knows about, you might have several sources that you rely on to create a story. The example he gave me: there have been a couple nonfiction books out on the Bernie Madoff scandal. If you base your novel on one of those books, so that it is the basis of the bulk of your research, then you could be sued for copyright infringement. But there have been thousands of stories written on the Madoff case, and there are hundreds of people who could be interviewed. If you spent time reading those, talked with people involved, and created a fictionalized account of a guy who created a Ponzi scheme and ripped off millions of dollars, you would not be violating that nonfiction author’s rights. Does that make sense?

28 Comments

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Wow! Thanks a lot, I am working on my very first work of fiction and was in a huge dilemma if my portrayal is decent enough. This post really helps!

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If you want to use a celebrities name or a band name as part of a conversation between two characters (not actually putting them in your novel), where are you in the eyes of the law- is that allowed or can they sue you?

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I’m currently writing a novel that has many POVs and a few main characters, I’m also writing it in first person. Having just read some previous questions you answered, I’m starting to doubt my work, I know it won’t be perfect on my first draft, but I have used the word ‘I’ quite a bit. Is it almost pointless continuing with this novel as it would have very low chances of doing well? Also, what would you say are upper limits to how many characters you should introduce and POVs you should write in? Thanks.

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One thing I can add here is that it seems to be “common knowledge” amongst editors and agents I’ve met or heard speak: young adult fiction = first person. Of course, it’s not like ALL YA fiction has to be, but…

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That’s certainly the trend, Donna Marie.

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My response to the person who wants to create a novel from a non-fiction book is an old saying: “To borrow from one source is plagiarism, to borrow from many is research.” Of course, I’m not a lawyer either so don’t come after me if you’re sued!

However, I think suing Dennis is a MUCH better idea than suing me. #sueDennisBrooksToday

Very interesting, Chip. I have one. I’m working on my first novel. It’s a supernatural romance, I would say…and you may have covered this the other day…but how many words should it be and how many words should I set for a daily goal?

A supernatural romance is probably going to run in the 85k to 95k range, Steve. As for a daily writing goal, a lot of part-time writers continue to strive for 1000 salable words per day. You can go up or down from there, but that’s a nice baseline.

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It could just be me; but I find that a third person narrative written really badly is—well, bad, but forgiveable if i like the plot or the characters; whereas a first person narrative written badly is completely intolerable. a first person narrative done badly in the present tense? — my least favourite thing of all time. I think this largely has to do with the strength of character voice as April mentions. Because the character is there to guide you and you are not given the omniscient support of an authorial voice, rather the musings of a character you are learning about, it is a bit of a double whammy if the character voice is weak. Not only are you striking out on the character voice front, then, but also on the narrative front as a whole. It’s harder, I feel, for a reader to forgive.

Ha! Well put, Rachel! Thanks very much. I agree with you.

In books for teens, first person is very common, to help the reader feel like he or she IS the main character. I once had an editor ask me to rewrite an entire novel from third to first. That being said, I think almost all of my recent teen novels are in third, to allow me to show more than one POV, and to heighten suspense by cutting back and forth.

i think the strongest argument for first person is if that character has a really strong voice.

Thanks, April. Appreciate your comment. (For those not in the know, April Henry is a bestselling novelist, with much good advice to share.)

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The POV comments and responses to fiction built on the real thing are enlightening – and inspiring of creativity. Thank you.

You’re welcome, Cherry.

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Some publishers might not care for first-person POV, but I’ll add another success story to your examples. Suzanne Collin wrote The Hunger Games in first-person and present tense, which jarred me in Chapter 1. But she makes it work.

Of course, the cinema version dramatizes the story in third person POV. I don’t think I’m ready to sit through a whole movie where the camera is the protagonist’s eyes and we “hear” her thinking. (Interesting idea, though.)

Thanks, Rick. I’ve had some people write to simply ask if I’d list some good first-person writers. Appreciate your note.

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Thanks again, Chip, for your great advice. A thought on POV. My first attempt at novel writing was a MG that had four POVs. I soon learned, thanks to my critique group and info gleaned from SCBWI conferences, that kids like/need a singular POV. Although I started writing in third person, I found first person so much easier for staying in my protagonist’s head. I now write in first person present for my ‘Tween novels and love the immediacy of it. Best advice I can give to novelists who write for kids–join the Society for Chidren’s Book Writers and Illustrators. It’s the best move I ever made as a writer. And join a critique group. The interaction with other writers is as valuable as their feedback.

Great! Thanks, Janet. Appreciate the advice.

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One more thought, on the “any similarities to real events is coincidental” or similar disclaimer. I recently saw this on a historical novel that was (partially) based on real historical events. In these cases, the disclaimer needs to be edited to allow for historical fact. On the other hand, the novel in question had a range of factual errors, so maybe the disclaimer was accurate (if unintentionally so).

“That endless parade of I-verbs creates a really dull novel”

Love the phrase! But you’re an agent. You must have read plenty of third-person novels with an endless parade of sentences beginning with ‘he’ or ‘she’. That’s just as bad.

And your comment on the number of POV characters is timely. As a reference, George RR Martin has nine POV characters in the first Game of Thrones book – but it’s almost 1000 pages long, and is the start of a seven-book series. That sheer scale gives him space to create characters that can’t be addressed in the 300 pages of the average novel.

Glad you liked it, Iola. Thanks for commenting.

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Good article, Chip. One misconception some writers have is that if they use a real character in a novel, that person can only sue if he or she is portrayed in a negative or defamatory light. Not so. There was a rather famous case a few decades ago where an author met a foreign dignitary at a Washington function and liked his name so much she used it in her novel and in a purely positive light. In fact, he was only in one small paragraph and the persona was completely positive. It was a scene where the protagonist was meeting and greeting dignitaries at a Washington function and that was the extent of the character’s role. He was introduced and moved on and disappeared from the story. The person sued and won–it didn’t matter if he was shown positively or negatively in the law’s eyes. He just plain didn’t want to be in her novel and the court agreed and he won substantial punitive damages. It’s a common misconception that the character be demeaned or portrayed negatively. Not the standard at all.

You’re right, Les. Thanks for this.

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Good stuff, Chip!

Appreciate that, Lee.

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Thanks for addressing these questions. I’ve experimented with first and third person POV before but never noticed the I-verb issue. Thank you. It’s something I’ll keep my eyes on to avoid.

Yeah, that’s a common problem, especially with newer writers, Jennifer.

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writing a book review in third person

How to start a novel in third person: 7 tips

There is no basic formula for how to start a novel in third person. Yet working with third person POV presents specific choices, challenges and advantages. Here are 7 tips for beginning a book in third person:

  • Post author By Jordan
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How to start a novel in third person - 7 tips from Now Novel

There is no basic formula for how to start a novel in third person. Yet working with third person POV presents specific choices, challenges and advantages. Here are 7 tips for beginning a book in third person:

1: Choose between third person limited, objective and omniscient

What is third person limited POV - Ursula le Guin quote

In a previous post, we defined and discussed different points of view . Once you have the basic premise of your story and you know where the first scene takes place and which characters it will involve, you need to choose how you our narrative style and create a distinctive voice for the narrator’s omniscient perspective.

In third person narration, the predominant pronouns describing the action of the story are ‘he’, ‘she’, and ‘they’. Third person narration may be ‘person limited’, ‘objective/uninvolved’ or an ‘omniscient narrator’ (or third person objective).

‘Limited’ third person narration isn’t told directly by the viewpoint character (there is no ‘I’ telling the story). Yet in third-person limited point of view limited we still see the story from the character’s perspective, even though the narrator stands outside the character, describing their actions.

e narrative voice belongs to the focal character. Third-person pronouns include ‘he’, ‘she’,  ‘they’ and them. This can work particularly well in mystery novels where holding back facts can heighten the suspense. For example, an omniscient narrator could be used for dramatic irony. For example: ‘She didn’t know, going into work that day, that her life was about to change completely.’  Or, ‘As he inserted the key in the lock of his apartment, he didn’t know that the killer was waiting for him in the kitchen.’

JK Rowling uses third-person limited narration in the Harry Potter novels, primarily following Harry’s perspective.

Ursula Le Guin describes how this type of third person narration is ‘limited’ concisely:

‘Only what the viewpoint character knows, feels, perceives, thinks, guesses, hopes, remembers, etc., can be told. The reader can infer what other people feel and are only from what the viewpoint character observes of their behaviour.’ ( Steering the Craft , pg. 85)

Le Guin notes how third person limited is similar to first person narration:

‘Tactically, limited third is identical to first person. It has exactly the same essential limitation: that nothing can be seen, known, or told except what the narrator sees, knows, and tells. That limitation concentrates the voice and gives apparent authenticity.’ (p. 85)

Objective third person narration, by contrast, does not give the narrator access to characters’ private thoughts and subjective feelings. The narrator is like the lens of a camera or a fly on a wall, merely recording what characters say and do without explicitly telling the reader about characters’ private emotional worlds.

Besides limited or objective third person narration, you can start a story in third-person omniscient point of view. Omniscient is similar to limited third person in that the narrator stands outside each viewpoint character, describing their words, deeds and inner monologues. Unlike limited third, however, in omniscient narration you can switch between characters’ viewpoints, even within a scene.  Using this type of narration, you can describe a room of a home or a landscape even when there is no character present to observe it, too. In this the narrator acts as an all-seeing eye.

Choosing a type of third person narration for your novel beginning will depend on the structure and ensemble in your first scene. Omniscient narration is effective when there are multiple, equally important characters present at the start of the story (such as a band of adventurers in a fantasy novel). Here, omniscient narration enables you to show how different characters feel. This multi-voiced narration is useful because you can develop multiple strong characters who each have their own individual arcs that unfold simultaneously. ou could write it in scenes, with each point of view (PoV character) ‘telling’ the story.

An interesting point to consider is that an omniscient narrator could even include ‘dear reader’ comments, as found in the novels of Charles Dickens and Jane Austen.

Alternatively, if you have a central protagonist who is the star of the story, limited third works well. Telling the story via a single, strong consciousness helps create connection between the reader and your main character.

2: Begin with character action and description that raises questions

Beginning authors often start third person stories with extensive backstory and character sketching. There’s no unbreakable rule that you can’t  ever do this. The danger, however, is that the beginning of the book will feel very obviously introductory. It shouts ‘I will now introduce you to my characters.’

You could  show the reader a character and tell them ‘here is what makes this character unique.’ Yet you could also show a character doing or saying something that creates interesting questions. The latter option helps to avoid the sense of an info dump. Ideally, your third person opening will introduce the reader to a specific scenario that helps readers see how your character’s situation promises further revelation, excitement or high drama.

In a third person scene opening, it helps to think about your character’s immediate goal(s) for the scene as well as long-range goals as well as to show character development. For example, you could describe a character racing to get to a crucial exam venue. This is the ‘scene goal’. The ‘arc goal’ (contributed to by the ‘scene goal’) could be your character’s ultimate career objective.

In addition to creating interest in characters’ actions, approach introductory description in third person with a light touch:

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3: Avoid introductory character descriptions that read as lists

When introducing characters in third person, it’s easy to go overboard on itemized character descriptions. ‘Jules was five feet tall and wore her hair in a ponytail. She had a loud laugh that frightened away birds and only hated two things: gym class and small, yappy dogs.’

This isn’t necessarily ‘wrong’ yet you could show many of these details in the course of the story rather than tell them all upfront. It’s easier to get lost in a story when we’re allowed to see character detail emerge alongside story events.Where possible, reveal character description in relation to the immediate action in a scene.

4: Remember not to use dialogue attribution in third person unless necessary

In learning how to start a novel in third person, dialogue is often an excellent choice. Characters’ voices lend some of the immediacy of first person narration. What’s more, you can avoid a build-up of repetitive ‘he’ or ‘she’ pronouns.

In opening scenes in third person, it can be tempting to overuse dialogue attribution to show who is speaking. Compare these two examples:

They were sitting quietly when Jules burst out laughing. Two birds that had been pecking in rings closer to the bench took off for the nearest tree. Gary, who had jumped a little himself, eyed her sidelong. ‘What’s so funny?’ he asked. ‘I was just thinking,’ she replied, ‘about what you said during assembly this morning.’

Compare the dialogue above to the following:

… Gary, who had jumped a little himself, eyed her sidelong. ‘What’s so funny?’ ‘I was just thinking about what you said in assembly this morning.’

The latter dialogue example is preferable. The words ‘he asked’ and ‘she replied’ are unnecessary. It’s clear from the question mark and the context that Gary is asking a question related to Jules’ outburst and it’s similarly clear it is Jules speaking in the reply.

When you begin a story in third person, remember that you don’t have to constantly remind the reader that there is a ‘he’ or a ‘she’ uttering each line. Instead, attribute statements by making characters address each other and by using context – surrounding actions and gestures.

5: Balance introducing character and setting

At the start of a third person narrative, it can be tempting to describe a character’s internal monologue exhaustively. Sometimes this results in thin scene setting. So much of the narrative focuses on characters’ feelings and plans that a sense of place is scant.

Alternatively, the freeing element of writing in third person can have the opposite effect. Since sticking to a single character’s perspective isn’t a constraint, you might give pages of introductory scene description.

Developing scene setting through character actions is an effective way to introduce characters and balance setting with character description. For example, compare the following:

‘The room was rubble, the scene of a colourful wrecking. Building blocks covered the floor. She would have to tidy it all up.’

‘She picked her way through the colourful rubble, surveying the aftermath. A bright yellow block jabbed her in the arch of her foot. She would have to tidy it all up.’

In the latter, we get the sense of a child’s play room as setting and a sense of the character’s weariness and physical presence at the same time. This balancing of setting and character is especially important at the start of a story where you are establishing your fictional world and its inhabitants.

6: Don’t make the narrator’s voice too intrusive

Starting a novel in first person is all about intrusive narration. The narrating ‘I’ is giving us access to their innermost thoughts and impressions. In third person narration, though, the narrator should be only lightly felt.

There are exceptions to every rule, however. You might choose to use a third person narrator who addresses the reader directly deliberately as a device. Still, if you want to create a sense of realism, it’s important to not make your narrator self-aware.

7: Learn from great examples of third person story openings

To learn how to start a novel in third person, the best thing to do is to read the openings of published novels that use third person POV effectively . There is no single ‘right’ way to start a story in first person. Reading examples by respected authors will help you gain a clearer sense of available approaches, though.

George Eliot, for example, in the classic novel Middlemarch , flouts tip number 3. Her introductory third person character description is fairly list-like:

‘Miss Brooke had that kind of beauty which seems to be thrown into relief by poor dress. Her hand and wrist were so finely formed that she could wear sleeves not less bare of style than those in which the Blessed Virgin appeared to Italian painters; and her profile as well as her stature and bearing seemed to gain the more dignity from her plain garments.’

Eliot’s story beginning is still effective as she moves from the general to the particular, which has the descriptive effect of zooming in on Dorothea Brooke with a telescope. At first Eliot describes Dorothea as having natural beauty plain clothes amplify. Eliot progresses to describe details, comparing Dorothea’s hands and wrists to details from paintings by Italian masters. Through all this, the reader forms a vivid impression of Dorothea, even before the character speaks.

Book cover - Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel

Modern readers might be more impatient with lengthy descriptions. Here is an example of a story beginning in third person that cuts straight to the action, from Hilary Mantel’s acclaimed historical novel Wolf Hall :

‘So now get up. Felled, dazed, silent, he has fallen; knocked full length on the cobbles of the yard. His head turns sideways; his eyes are turned towards the gate, as if someone might arrive to help him out. One blow, properly placed, could kill him now.’

Mantel’s opening fits the advice under heading number 5 above. It balances character description and setting. A sense of the character being in a dire predicament unfolds together with a keen sense of place – the cobbled yard. The overall effect is to make the scene vivid. Mantel also does not over-rely on the pronoun ‘he’. Instead, she creates strong sentences using active adjectives (‘felled, dazed, silent’) and varied sentence subjects.

Read through third person story openings and write down your own observations about what they do effectively. Ask what questions they raise, what story developments they promise, and how the writer uses third person.

Share your favourite third person story opening in the comments, then get feedback on your own story beginning from Now Novel’s helpful writing community.

Related Posts:

  • How to start a story in first person: 8 pointers
  • Writing third person limited POV: Tips and examples
  • First person narrative: 7 tips for writing great narrators
  • Tags how to start a story , POV , third person narration

writing a book review in third person

Jordan is a writer, editor, community manager and product developer. He received his BA Honours in English Literature and his undergraduate in English Literature and Music from the University of Cape Town.

8 replies on “How to start a novel in third person: 7 tips”

this is amazing. I need help editing my third person novel right now

Hi Marissa, if you mean a narrator who addresses the reader directly, there’s the famous ‘Reader, I married him’ in Jane Eyre. Generally intrusive narrators who break the fourth wall and talk to the reader directly are quite uncommon these days (they were used often in realist novels in the 19th Century). Holden Caulfield is another more modern example in Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye (in fact the book opens with Holden cautioning the reader on their expectations of his story). Good luck with it!

I meant in a third person novel. I’m confused on what is considered a POV error when it comes to writing 3rd person limited.

I’m attempting to write my autobiography, do these same rules apply in this form of writing? Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

I think these rules apply more to fiction writing than autobiographies

It’s far more common to use first-person POV in autobiography, however Roland Barthes wrote his autobiography ‘Roland Barthes by Roland Barthes’ in the third person, commenting on the fact that one can feel like a character when writing about oneself (in the front-pages, he writes ‘All of this should be read as if spoken by someone in a novel’). I hope your autobiography has come a long way!

This was quite helpful. I’m writing a fantasy novel and I just know where to begin. I am a very amature writer and I wanted to get a book right for once. So thanks a lot. I took your tip in reading a couple 3rd person novels and it’s given me some ideas. Thanks!

Hi Lilly, we’re so glad to hear that! Good luck with your fantasy novel 🙂

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writing a book review in third person

The Pros & Cons Of Writing In Third Person

Writers Write is a writing resource. In this post, we look at the pros and cons of writing in third person.

I have discussed first and second person during the last two weeks, this week I want to talk about third person . Remember, the viewpoint you use will either bring your readers closer or take them further away from your story. First and second, for example, are closer than third person – attached or omniscient – or a narrator.

We use the pronouns he, she, it, and they, for third person. We often use third person in crime and romance novels. Back in the day, before self-publishing, we had to cater to very rigid genre demands, but as the rules of genre and of writing in general change and evolve your choice of viewpoint is, mostly, up to you and your story. We have a lot more room to play.

Consider this example of third person attached or limited:

The pros & cons of writing in third person.

Third person seems to be common ground, for readers and writers. It is a space where most people are comfortable. You can divide third person into attached, omniscient and narrator.

Third person attached gives you one person’s perspective. You, attach the ‘camera’ to their shoulder and tell everything from their perspective. As with first person, the telling of the events will be biased according to their experiences, upbringing, age or gender. Unreliable narrators can completely alter the events to suit themselves.

Third person omniscient is a know-all, tell-all viewpoint. Instead of attaching the camera to one character, the camera hovers over the story. The camera, who is the teller, knows everything. This doesn’t mean the reader knows everything upfront, it is up to the omniscient teller to reveal details as they see fit.

A narrator is an observer. He tells us a character goes into a store, but he doesn’t know why. He can only tell us what he sees, he can’t explain the motivations behind the character’s actions. It makes for a non-judgemental telling.

Six Rules For Writing In Third Person

  • You can use multiple viewpoin t characters to tell your story. All types of third person viewpoint can be used for more than one character, but be careful. The golden rule is to stick to one character per scene. Do not head-hop.
  • Your characters must be distinct. If they all sound the same, I won’t believe your story. Your characters will be dull and flat.
  • Do not choose too many viewpoint characters. The fewer viewpoint characters you have, the stronger your story will be. There are, of course exceptions, but as a beginner, I’d encourage you not to use more than three.
  • Try not to make every character a viewpoint character. It is annoying getting to know a character in a scene and then never seeing or hearing from them again. Viewpoint characters should make frequent long appearances in books.
  • You’ll know which viewpoint character to use for which scene by establishing which character experiences the biggest emotional change. This should be the viewpoint character.
  • Make sure your character doesn’t have information they shouldn’t have. How does your character know the secret for example? Just because the narrator knows and the reader knows it doesn’t necessarily put your character in a place where they will know. Consider an affair. If the ‘cheater’ is a viewpoint character, the reader will be aware of the subterfuge, but the spouse can still be blissfully ignorant. How will they find out?

Have fun with your viewpoint. Challenge yourself; we tend fall into ruts because we repeat the same thing. Changing viewpoint is a great way to spice things up.

Example of third person omniscient:

Example of third person attached:, example of first person:, example of second person:.

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writing a book review in third person

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0 thoughts on “The Pros & Cons Of Writing In Third Person”

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Great article, Mia! Thank you for the much needed insight, I know the groups I have joined (and stayed on) discuss this often.

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Thanks for your examples above if writing in 1 st, 2nd, and 3rd person.

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Some helpful advice and good things to think about, but I disagree with some of it. Film has the luxury of (usually) not being inside characters’ heads, and thus it has more freedom to jump around to any scene involving anyone without a main character present. We can see things a main character did not witness. I don’t see how it’s a bad thing if a book does the same thing, as long as it’s done well. If the story you want to tell NEEDS to be able to jump to many scenes involving many people, go for it. It’s silly to limit yourself and it’d be even sillier if books were not allowed to tell those kinds of stories. I don’t think it’s necessarily annoying to have a short-lived pov that never pops up again. Viewpoints don’t need to be frequent and long if it’s obvious this is just a small scene with one-off characters. Though I guess these small scenes don’t always need to be inside someone’s head and can just be omniscient, with just the narrator witnessing the event. You could harp on about how that’s lazy, impersonal and distances the reader by not letting them experience the scene through a character, but eh again if film can do it why not books? I just feel instead of just telling people that they shouldn’t do something, explore all sides of it. Tell them the benefits of doing the opposite. You say there are exceptions. What are the exceptions?

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writing a book review in third person

The Third Person: Writing in the Aftermath of a Home Robbery

Kate sidley wrote about tidy mysteries in a faraway country. then real violence came into her home..

At my desk in the office at the bottom of the garden, under a jacaranda tree, in one of the most violent countries in the world, I write a murder mystery series set in a pretty village in the Cotswolds, in England. In real life, the Cotswolds is a place where the murder rate is close to zero. A local news article “Rise in violent crime in Cotswolds” tells us that there was one homicide—a category which includes both murder and manslaughter—in the year 2022. In the previous 12 months, there had been none.

In our books, life in the Cotswolds is far more perilous. Under the pen name Katie Gayle, my co-author Gail Schimmel and I have killed off a dozen or so people in six books and counting, in a popular genre called “cozy mystery.” Think Murder She Wrote , or the books of Agatha Christie or Richard Osman.

A defining characteristic of this genre is the absence of graphic violence, grit and gore. When bad things happen, they happen off-page, out of sight, and with a certain delicacy. The victims are more often than not pushed off hilltop walking paths, or drowned in picturesque lakes, or bonked on the head in the heat of the moment with heavy domestic objects (a frying pan, a doorstop). When readers meet them, the violence is over. Some of the victims are long dead, but recently discovered. The crime is solved not by the police, but by an amateur sleuth—in our case, Julia Bird, a practical, wise woman of 60+—using instinct and good old common sense. Thanks to her efforts, justice is served. 

I forget exactly what I was writing that morning, a year ago—perhaps Julia was taking a walk through the soft green of the spring woods with her chocolate labrador, or on her way to her volunteer job at the local Charity Shop where she might happen upon a useful clue—when a man appeared at the door of my office with a gun. 

I had heard the garage door open, and my son’s footsteps, and his voice: “My mom’s in there.” When I looked up, he was standing at my door with another man, who I took for a friend until I saw that he was older, and he was holding my son’s arm tightly, and he had a gun. Three more men jostled nervously behind him. 

Because I don’t live in a village in the Cotswolds, but in suburban Johannesburg, I said to myself, quite rationally, “Ah, okay, so this is how it goes down. An armed robbery. It’s finally happening to us.” I know dozens of people who have been robbed, carjacked, mugged, scammed, and held up, but other than the cellphones pickpocketed from my kids at clubs and festivals over the years, we have largely dodged the odds for decades.

The man cut to the chase: “Do you love this boy?” 

I assured him in a voice so calm I didn’t recognise it, that yes, I love the boy. 

“Where are the guns… the safe… the money?”

We own neither guns nor a safe full of cash—I wondered briefly if everyone else had such things, and if our oversight in this matter made things better or worse for us—but I assured him that I would give him whatever else he wanted.

And I did. 

I gave him the wedding ring off my finger. All my “good” jewelry, my mother’s and my grandmothers’, none of which I ever wore, because who, in Johannesburg, would be so foolish as to wander about in gran’s amethysts? Instead, I tucked the little sack of treasure into the corner of a high up cupboard in my bedroom, and when the moment came, I climbed on a stool and handed it over at gunpoint. I feel there’s an edifying lesson there, or an inspiring meme about wearing your good bra and lighting the Jo Malone candles, but that’s not the point I’m here to make. 

They took phones and laptops. Passports and bank cards. A crappy television. My RayBans. The saxophone my husband has played in dozens of bands since he was 17. Oh, and our car, which the boy had been driving when they followed him into the garage and held him up.

Because we were mostly face down on the carpet while the men ransacked the place, other absences went unnoticed, and months later, when we’d ask each other, “Have you seen my black coat… my torch… the backgammon set…” (That last, in a smart leather case, was a disappointment, I’m sure).

The trauma counselor had me look at a point on the wall next to her and give a brief account of what happened on that day. I was to tell it fast, without dwelling on details, and I was to tell it in the third person, as if it had happened to someone else. 

This intrigued me. One of the most defining choices you make as a novelist is that of the narrative voice, or point of view. It’s the perspective from which the story is told. Each narrative position brings with it its own problems and possibilities. 

The voice that comes most naturally to me as a writer is the close third person. The best way to describe it is as if the protagonist has a camera on her shoulder, showing the reader the action. It’s not the protagonist herself talking (that would be first person), but it is the protagonist’s view of the world. 

The close third person is, in many respects, a terrible choice of narrative voice. It’s one that causes me no end of trouble. It has all the disadvantages of the first person narrator—you can only see what your protagonist sees, think what she thinks. It means your protagonist has to be in every scene, and has to find out anything that happens “off stage” through investigation, conversation or some other means. 

The close third person also lacks the advantages of the more traditional omniscient third person narrator, who resides outside of the action, who can travel through space and time, who can get into anyone’s head, who knows what everyone in the story knows—and sometimes more. 

I’m not cut out for all-knowing omniscience. Or for the constant spotlight of the “I.” The close third’s slanted intimacy, the feeling of being almost inside the protagonist’s head, but a little detached, works for me.

And now here I was in the trauma counselor’s room, telling my robbery story in some therapised version of the close third person, speaking fast, as instructed, without explanation or elaboration. 

She walked into the house with him behind her…

They took the boy…

He told her to lie down…

I offered none of the details that a novelist would ordinarily linger over and polish, or work for effect. The way the robbers stepped politely over the sleeping dog on their way into the house. The peculiar feeling of a shared objective with my captor, working together to get this thing done quickly. His heavy work boots – all I saw of him, as I kept my head down to avoid seeing his face. The heft of the little drawstring velvet pouch of rings and necklaces in my palm. The weird sense of time, and the wondering—are we halfway through this yet, maybe even three quarters? The hyper-vigilant listening, the gratitude for every minute without the sound of a gunshot. 

He pointed… 

She nodded…

In a couple of minutes, the tale was told. It sounds kooky, but I’m not averse to a bit of kooky in extremis , and it seemed to sort of work. My words raced, relating the events, but for the first time, my heart did not. I was detached from my own story.

Gradually, we begin to feel calmer. Family, friends and neighbors hold us with their bountiful love, care and food (even in trauma, a young man welcomes a lasagne). We go again to the trauma counselor. We sleep a little better. There’s less weeping. Less forgetting of words, appointments, pots on the stove. I no longer feel as if my veins run thick with cortisol soup. 

You might call it healing.

In a murder mystery story, the discovery of a second body brings new information. It provides fresh clues and opens up the investigation in surprising new ways. It discounts certain potential suspects and brings others to the fore. It tells our sleuth something she didn’t previously know.

Two months after our robbery, on a warm summer evening, I returned home from a poetry club meeting, buoyed by words and friendship and a glass of champagne, to find my husband standing outside on the veranda waiting and pacing. 

“J is dead.”

I knew from his face that there was more.

“He was killed. In a home robbery.”

Not far from where we live, in a suburban home on a tree-lined street, a gentle, brilliant man, a poet, a writer, a husband and father, had been stabbed. 

The cortisol soup came sloshing back. My son sat with me on the step. We hugged each other and sobbed, my boy and I. All the holding-it-together, and the could-have-been worse, was revealed as naïveté, as foolishness. Something in us broke, possibly forever.

If the second body tells our fictional sleuth something useful that she didn’t know before, this second, devastating real world crime told us something horrifying, something intolerable—that we are not safe. That no one is.

It told us that the world is even more terrible than we had imagined. What we had tried to pass off as a random, isolated incident, was in fact one stitch in a great fabric of violence. This was the way the world was—vile and brutal and not to be trusted.

It told us that the close third person recounting was wishful thinking. There is no safe distance at which to observe. This was, and always would be, a first person encounter. 

I was held up. They pointed a gun at me , and worse, much worse, at my beloved child. 

J was killed. His children lost their father.

The same is true of every one of the too many victims of violence. Each one, the I in their story . Each someone else’s beloved my .

I write this on the one year anniversary of the robbery. My boy is studying in Amsterdam. I miss him like a phantom limb, but I am pleased he’s there. I’m still here in the ‘burbs, in the peculiar middle class South African space of being both comfortable and deeply uncomfortable. I walk the parks and pavements daily with the elderly stepped-over dog, feeling mostly safe, always vigilant. 

I no longer work in the little office in the garden, with its window overlooking the bird table where crested barbets eat papaya. It had been my haven since the busy days of a house full of children, a place where I’ve written hundreds of articles and books, but since the men with the guns, I haven’t felt calm there. I hope to go back one day. In the meantime, I work as an itinerant, in the tv room, or at the kitchen table, sometimes in another city, writing improbable tales of death in the Cotswolds, for a British publisher, for English and American readers.

It’s only because of their sheer implausibility that we can invent these curiously delicate yet alarmingly regular deaths in fictional country villages (let alone the successful investigations by a woman of a certain age). Readers and writers know it’s a set-up, a trope, a fantasy. In real life, those people are safe.

Where I live, no one is truly safe and violence is never off-page. It’s in your own car or house, or on the street, or in the park. It’s in your head. A clever elderly lady and her labrador are not going to solve a crime, or prevent the next one, and neither, in all likelihood, will the police. I live with a deep sense of vulnerability, and an intimate knowledge of danger. Many people in my country live much closer to that knowledge than I do.

There’s nothing cozy about violence in the real world. Perhaps packaging up the unthinkable as such is a way of acknowledging the horror of the world, while keeping it at a distance—the distance we experience in the third person, or the trauma counselor’s office. The inevitable tragedy of life is wreathed in natural beauty, and community, with a cat on its knee and a cream scone at hand. Someone does come to save the day. Bad people are punished, or repent. Good people are rewarded. Order is restored and justice is served. Our deepest, primal longings are fulfilled. On the page, at least.

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Kate Sidley

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Guest Essay

The Most Important Writing Exercise I’ve Ever Assigned

An illustration of several houses. One person walks away from a house with a second person isolated in a window.

By Rachel Kadish

Ms. Kadish is the author of the novel “The Weight of Ink.”

“Write down a phrase you find abhorrent — something you yourself would never say.”

My students looked startled, but they cooperated. They knew I wouldn’t collect this exercise; what they wrote would be private unless they chose to share it. All that was required of them was participation.

In silence they jotted down a few words. So far, so good. We hadn’t yet reached the hard request: Spend 10 minutes writing a monologue in the first person that’s spoken by a fictitious character who makes the upsetting statement. This portion typically elicits nervous glances. When that happens, I remind students that their statement doesn’t represent them and that speaking as if they’re someone else is a basic skill of fiction writers. The troubling statement, I explain, must appear in the monologue, and it shouldn’t be minimized, nor should students feel the need to forgive or account for it. What’s required is simply that somewhere in the monologue there be an instant — even a fleeting phrase — in which we can feel empathy for the speaker. Perhaps she’s sick with worry over an ill grandchild. Perhaps he’s haunted by a love he let slip away. Perhaps she’s sleepless over how to keep her business afloat and her employees paid. Done right, the exercise delivers a one-two punch: repugnance for a behavior or worldview coupled with recognition of shared humanity.

For more than two decades, I’ve taught versions of this fiction-writing exercise. I’ve used it in universities, middle schools and private workshops, with 7-year-olds and 70-year-olds. But in recent years openness to this exercise and to the imaginative leap it’s designed to teach has shrunk to a pinprick. As our country’s public conversation has gotten angrier, I’ve noticed that students’ approach to the exercise has become more brittle, regardless of whether students lean right or left.

Each semester, I wonder whether the aperture through which we allow empathy has so drastically narrowed as to foreclose a full view of our fellow human beings. Maybe there are times so contentious or so painful that people simply withdraw to their own silos. I’ve certainly felt that inward pull myself. There are times when a leap into someone else’s perspective feels impossible.

But leaping is the job of the writer, and there’s no point it doing it halfway. Good fiction pulls off a magic trick of absurd power: It makes us care. Responding to the travails of invented characters — Ahab or Amaranta, Sethe or Stevens, Zooey or Zorba — we might tear up or laugh, or our hearts might pound. As readers, we become invested in these people, which is very different from agreeing with or even liking them. In the best literature, characters are so vivid, complicated, contradictory and even maddening that we’ll follow them far from our preconceptions; sometimes we don’t return.

Unflinching empathy, which is the muscle the lesson is designed to exercise, is a prerequisite for literature strong enough to wrestle with the real world. On the page it allows us to spot signs of humanity; off the page it can teach us to start a conversation with the strangest of strangers, to thrive alongside difference. It can even affect those life-or-death choices we make instinctively in a crisis. This kind of empathy has nothing to do with being nice, and it’s not for the faint of heart.

Even within the safety of the page, it’s tempting to dodge empathy’s challenge, instead demonizing villains and idealizing heroes, but that’s when the needle on art’s moral compass goes inert. Then we’re navigating blind: confident that we know what the bad people look like and that they’re not us — and therefore we’re at no risk of error.

Our best writers, in contrast, portray humans in their full complexity. This is what Gish Jen is doing in the short story “Who’s Irish?” and Rohinton Mistry in the novel “A Fine Balance.” Line by line, these writers illuminate the inner worlds of characters who cause harm — which is not the same as forgiving them. No one would ever say that Toni Morrison forgives the character Cholly Breedlove, who rapes his daughter in “The Bluest Eye.” What Ms. Morrison accomplishes instead is the boldest act of moral and emotional understanding I’ve ever seen on the page.

In the classroom exercise, the upsetting phrases my students scribble might be personal (“You’ll never be a writer,” “You’re ugly”) or religious or political. Once a student wrote a phrase condemning abortion as another student across the table wrote a phrase defending it. Sometimes there are stereotypes, slurs — whatever the students choose to grapple with. Of course, it’s disturbing to step into the shoes of someone whose words or deeds repel us. Writing these monologues, my graduate students, who know what “first person” means, will dodge and write in third, with the distanced “he said” instead of “I said.”

But if they can withstand the challenges of first person, sometimes something happens. They emerge shaken and eager to expand on what they’ve written. I look up from tidying my notes to discover students lingering after dismissal with that alert expression that says the exercise made them feel something they needed to feel.

Over the years, as my students’ statements became more political and as jargon (“deplorables,” “snowflakes”) supplanted the language of personal experience, I adapted the exercise. Worrying that I’d been too sanguine about possible pitfalls, I made it entirely silent, so no student would have to hear another’s troubling statement or fear being judged for their own. Any students who wanted to share their monologues with me could stay after class rather than read to the group. Later, I added another caveat: If your troubling statement is so offensive, you can’t imagine the person who says it as a full human being, choose something less troubling. Next, I narrowed the parameters: No politics. The pandemic’s virtual classes made risk taking harder; I moved the exercise deeper into the semester so students would feel more at ease.

After one session, a student stayed behind in the virtual meeting room. She’d failed to include empathy in her monologue about a character whose politics she abhorred. Her omission bothered her. I was impressed by her honesty. She’d constructed a caricature and recognized it. Most of us don’t.

For years, I’ve quietly completed the exercise alongside my students. Some days nothing sparks. When it goes well, though, the experience is disquieting. The hard part, it turns out, isn’t the empathy itself but what follows: the annihilating notion that people whose fears or joys or humor I appreciate may themselves be indifferent to all my cherished conceptions of the world.

Then the 10-minute timer sounds, and I haul myself back to the business of the classroom — shaken by the vastness of the world but more curious about the people in it. I put my trust in that curiosity. What better choice does any of us have? And in the sanctuary of my classroom I keep trying, handing along what literature handed me: the small, sturdy magic trick any of us can work, as long as we’re willing to risk it.

Rachel Kadish is the author of the novel “The Weight of Ink.”

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Why did Savannah write a faith-based book? Because she’s the person who ‘needs to read it’

The TODAY co-anchor took on a challenge that was both thrilling and scary when she decided to write her latest book, "Mostly What God Does."

Savannah Guthrie challenged herself to leave her comfort zone and “do something thrilling and scary” when she wrote her new book about faith, “Mostly What God Does: Reflections on Seeking and Finding His Love Everywhere.”

The process was scary for the TODAY co- anchor , who is Christian, because she is, in her words, a “regular person” — not a theologian, not a religious scholar. And yet it was thrilling because her faith is an essential part of who she is.

“It’s what makes me tick. It’s what makes me joyful. It’s what helps me navigate the world and stresses and disappointments and fears,” she tells TODAY.com.

In the foreword for “Mostly What God Does,” a collection of essays and personal reflections released Feb. 20, she lays out her “road map” for the chapters that follow, based on what she describes as the six foundational aspects of a connection to God, including love, hope and purpose. She then notes that the book isn’t solely intended for those who have a firm belief in God.

“You may be faith-full, you may be faith-curious, you may be faith-less, still scarred by a toxic religiosity of your past,” she writes. Regardless of which category applies to you, Savannah invites you to “come as you are.”

“I’m not writing this book from some mountaintop where I’ve received some wisdom, and now I’m imparting it to the world,” she explains in the TODAY.com interview. “No, I’m still down here, struggling. Still down here, disappointing myself. I’m still down here, needing faith, needing grace, needing mercy, needing love. That’s why I wrote the book — because I’m the person that needs to read it. And so I thought, if I do, then maybe others do, too.”

Embarking on an important journey

Prior to working on what became “Mostly What God Does,” Savannah, 52, had co-authored two children’s books and was subsequently pitched follow-up projects.

“From time to time over the years since I wrote those kids’ books, I might get an offer to write something: another children’s book or laughably even a cookbook once,” she shares, with a nod to her relative lack of skill in the kitchen that inspired the TODAY All Day series “Starting from Scratch with Savannah Guthrie.”

“But I’ve always been so busy with the (TODAY) show and I’ve got little kids and I never really wanted to write anything,” the mom of two continues.

Then, about a year ago, she was presented with the opportunity to write a book about faith, and she says she felt intrigued, excited and challenged by the idea. She decided to give it a try, since she considers her faith to be her greatest passion.

The cover of Savannah's new book.

“I wasn’t sure there would be a book at the end of it, but I knew that it would be a really important path and journey to take,” she adds.

Her interest in faith can be traced back to her childhood, growing up as a Baptist in what she calls a “very churchy family.”

“We would go three times a week. It was very much part of my upbringing,” she recalls. “My sister has the best line in the book: She said, ‘God was the sixth member of our family,’ in our family of five.”

Though “Mostly What God Does” is not a tell-all memoir, as Savannah is quick to point out in the foreword, she does reference some of the struggles she has faced personally and professionally, including the loss of her father to a heart attack when she was a teenager ; a divorce in her mid-30s; and her winding career path before she landed her co-anchor seat at TODAY.

Over the years, she says, she’s gone through “seasons of devout study and enthusiasm” about her faith, and also “seasons of distance and disappointment,” when her relationship with God wasn’t as strong.

“All of what I have come to realize is that all of that is my faith story: belief and doubt, you know, joy, and also disappointment and sorrow. It’s all part of my faith journey,” she says. “It’s all enhanced what I believe and have come to understand about God.”

Spreading a message of love

The title of Savannah’s book gets to the heart of the message she wanted to get across with the project: “Mostly what God does is love you,” a phrase taken from a translation by scholar and pastor Eugene Peterson of a Bible verse. The theme of love is one that she knew early on in the writing process she wanted to focus on.

“That sentence always hit me, and I loved it,” she explains. “Because I think so many of us, particularly if you do come from any kind of faith background, you may be asking yourself, ‘What does God think of me? What is God doing right now? What does God think of that choice I made? Am I selfish? Am I flawed beyond reconciliation?’

“The answer is, ‘Mostly what God does is love you.’ What has he been doing this whole time? Just loving you. And I love the simplicity and bareness of it. It’s simple, but it’s not easy.”

Even if a reader is not of faith or is struggling with doubt, Savannah hopes that message of love still resonates.

“I hope the book is appealing and compelling to anyone in any walk of life, because it’s just a gentle call to be loved. And once you feel that love, well, you’ll find that you can’t help but share it. It’s just contagious. And I think that’s really the thrust of the book and really what I was trying to say,” she says.

That positive outlook ties in with one of Savannah’s other foundational aspects of a connection to God: hope. Savannah acknowledges that it can be challenging to hold on to hope in difficult times, when we are inundated with depressing news headlines.

Her faith and her hope provide her with perspective in such situations: “When I get discouraged, I try to go back to basics and remember that I’m not in charge. God is. And that I trust him and believe him and hope in him.”

However, she quickly adds that hope is a “word, it’s not certainty.” She asks in her book, what if there is no silver lining? What if there is no justice in store for the world? What if, she writes, “this whole idea of God is just a figment, a soothing story we tell ourselves?”

These are all reasonable questions to wonder. Still, Savannah chooses to live a life of optimism.

“None of us on Earth here can know if God is real or how it ends, right? We’re humans; we don’t get to know. No one knows what happens after death. No one comes back to tell. Fact. I would rather be hopeful and turn out to be wrong at the end than hopeless and turn out to be right,” she tells TODAY.com. “Hope is the posture that I choose every single day.

“And it’s not a blind hope. I think there are things all around that reassure and confirm that hope. But in the end, it is faith. That’s why they call it a leap of faith. It’s a leap of hope. And so I try to hang on to hope.”

I would rather be hopeful and turn out to be wrong at the end than hopeless and turn out to be right.

Savannah guthrie

Passing down her faith to her children

Much like her sister has said that God was the sixth member of their family growing up, Savannah is trying to make God a part of her family with husband Mike Feldman, who is Jewish, and their two children, daughter Vale, 9, and son Charley, 7 . That includes a nightly ritual of saying prayers with the kids.

“What I know is that it’s my job to give them the building blocks to teach them about the God that I know and help foster that connection,” Savannah says. “And then I also know that when they grow up, it will be their choice. And it’s just my job to give them as much information but also experience with God as I possibly can.”

Savannah mentions how excited Vale was when she was recently baptized at the church their family attends. At the time, she made a comment that touched her mom.

“She said, ‘Today, God, I joined your family.’ And that gives me a lot of joy,” Savannah shares.

Vale has read “quite a bit” of her mom’s book, and perhaps not surprisingly, she approves of it, particularly the parts that reference her. (It seems she didn’t mind Savannah bringing up the difficult aspects of motherhood in the book — for example, the bad behavior or “epic sibling throwdowns” at nighttime that Savannah and her husband often deal with.)

Charley has heard Vale read the book out loud, and he did question the inclusion of a less-than-flattering story that involved him.

“He doesn’t love that, like, there’s a part about how he threw the train at my eye when he was 2. You know, he’s like, ‘Did you have to tell that story?’” laughs Savannah, years after the accident that caused a tear in her retina that resulted in multiple surgeries.

Charley’s concerns notwithstanding, Savannah would love for her children to read the book and gain more of an appreciation for it when they are older.

“I wrote it for them, and it’s dedicated to them. It’s everything I would want to tell them,” she says. “If I died tomorrow — not to sound morose — it’s what I would want them to know about the God that loves them.”

writing a book review in third person

Shane Lou is a senior editor for TODAY.com.

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Google’s Gemini is now in everything. Here’s how you can try it out.

Gmail, Docs, and more will now come with Gemini baked in. But Europeans will have to wait before they can download the app.

  • Will Douglas Heaven archive page

In the biggest mass-market AI launch yet, Google is rolling out Gemini , its family of large language models, across almost all its products, from Android to the iOS Google app to Gmail to Docs and more. You can also now get your hands on Gemini Ultra, the most powerful version of the model, for the first time.  

With this launch, Google is sunsetting Bard , the company's answer to ChatGPT. Bard, which has been powered by a version of Gemini since December, will now be known as Gemini too.  

ChatGPT , released by Microsoft-backed OpenAI just 14 months ago, changed people’s expectations of what computers could do. Google, which has been racing to catch up ever since, unveiled its Gemini family of models in December. They are multimodal large language models that can interact with you via voice, image, and text. Google claimed that its own benchmarking showed that Gemini could outperform OpenAI's multimodal model, GPT-4, on a range of standard tests. But the margins were slim. 

By baking Gemini into its ubiquitous products, Google is hoping to make up lost ground. “Every launch is big, but this one is the biggest yet,” Sissie Hsiao, Google vice president and general manager of Google Assistant and Bard (now Gemini), said in a press conference yesterday. “We think this is one of the most profound ways that we’re going to advance our company’s mission.”

But some will have to wait longer than others to play with Google’s new toys. The company has announced rollouts in the US and East Asia but said nothing about when the Android and iOS apps will come to the UK or the rest of Europe. This may be because the company is waiting for the EU’s new AI Act to be set in stone, says Dragoș Tudorache, a Romanian politician and member of the European Parliament, who was a key negotiator on the law.

“We’re working with local regulators to make sure that we’re abiding by local regime requirements before we can expand,” Hsiao said. “Rest assured, we are absolutely working on it and I hope we’ll be able to announce expansion very, very soon.”

How can you get it? Gemini Pro, Google’s middle-tier model that has been available via Bard since December, will continue to be available for free on the web at gemini.google.com (rather than bard.google.com). But now there is a mobile app as well.

If you have an Android device, you can either download the Gemini app or opt in to an upgrade in Google Assistant. This will let you call up Gemini in the same way that you use Google Assistant: by pressing the power button, swiping from the corner of the screen, or saying “Hey, Google!” iOS users can download the Google app, which will now include Gemini.

Gemini will pop up as an overlay on your screen, where you can ask it questions or give it instructions about whatever’s on your phone at the time, such as summarizing an article or generating a caption for a photo.  

Finally, Google is launching a paid-for service called Gemini Advanced. This comes bundled in a subscription costing $19.99 a month that the company is calling the Google One Premium AI Plan. It combines the perks of the existing Google One Premium Plan, such as 2TB of extra storage, with access to Google's most powerful model, Gemini Ultra, for the first time. This will compete with OpenAI’s paid-for service, ChatGPT Plus, which buys you access to the more powerful GPT-4 (rather than the default GPT-3.5) for $20 a month.

At some point soon (Google didn't say exactly when) this subscription will also unlock Gemini across Google’s Workspace apps like Docs, Sheets, and Slides, where it works as a smart assistant similar to the GPT-4-powered Copilot that Microsoft is trialing in Office 365.

When can you get it? The free Gemini app (powered by Gemini Pro) is available from today in English in the US. Starting next week, you’ll be able to access it across the Asia Pacific region in English and in Japanese and Korean. But there is no word on when the app will come to the UK, countries in the EU, or Switzerland.

Gemini Advanced (the paid-for service that gives access to Gemini Ultra) is available in English in more than 150 countries, including the UK and EU (but not France). Google says it is analyzing local requirements and fine-tuning Gemini for cultural nuance in different countries. But the company promises that more languages and regions are coming.

What can you do with it? Google says it has developed its Gemini products with the help of more than 100 testers and power users. At the press conference yesterday, Google execs outlined a handful of use cases, such as getting Gemini to help write a cover letter for a job application. “This can help you come across as more professional and increase your relevance to recruiters,” said Google’s vice president for product management, Kristina Behr.

Or you could take a picture of your flat tire and ask Gemini how to fix it. A more elaborate example involved Gemini managing a snack rota for the parents of kids on a soccer team. Gemini would come up with a schedule for who should bring snacks and when, help you email other parents, and then field their replies. In future versions, Gemini will be able to draw on data in your Google Drive that could help manage carpooling around game schedules, Behr said.   

But we should expect people to come up with a lot more uses themselves. “I’m really excited to see how people around the world are going to push the envelope on this AI,” Hsaio said.

Is it safe? Google has been working hard to make sure its products are safe to use. But no amount of testing can anticipate all the ways that tech will get used and misused once it is released. In the last few months, Meta saw people use its image-making app to produce pictures of Mickey Mouse with guns and SpongeBob SquarePants flying a jet into two towers. Others used Microsoft’s image-making software to create fake pornographic images of Taylor Swift .

The AI Act aims to mitigate some—but not all—of these problems. For example, it requires the makers of powerful AI like Gemini to build in safeguards, such as watermarking for generated images and steps to avoid reproducing copyrighted material. Google says that all images generated by its products will include its SynthID watermarks. 

Like most companies, Google was knocked onto the back foot when ChatGPT arrived. Microsoft’s partnership with OpenAI has given it a boost over its old rival. But with Gemini, Google has come back strong: this is the slickest packaging of this generation’s tech yet. 

Artificial intelligence

Ai for everything: 10 breakthrough technologies 2024.

Generative AI tools like ChatGPT reached mass adoption in record time, and reset the course of an entire industry.

What’s next for AI in 2024

Our writers look at the four hot trends to watch out for this year

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OpenAI teases an amazing new generative video model called Sora

The firm is sharing Sora with a small group of safety testers but the rest of us will have to wait to learn more.

Deploying high-performance, energy-efficient AI

Investments into downsized infrastructure can help enterprises reap the benefits of AI while mitigating energy consumption, says corporate VP and GM of data center platform engineering and architecture at Intel, Zane Ball.

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IMAGES

  1. 6 Ways to Write in Third Person

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  2. Writing in the Third Person From the First Person

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  3. What Is Third-Person Point of View and How Can You Use It in Your

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  5. 5 Ways to Write in Third Person

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  6. 5 Ways to Write in Third Person

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VIDEO

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  1. How to Write a Professional Book Review

    How To How to Write a Professional Book Review Arvyn Cerézo Jul 7, 2020 With the boom of Goodreads and book blogging in the past few years, everyone became self-proclaimed book critics. But as much fun as it is writing about books, these platforms don't let writers earn bucks on the side.

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    7 tips for writing in the third person Bonus tip (advanced): Learn the different types of third-person POV Conclusion FAQs Alana Chase Students Whether you're a student, business professional, or writer, knowing how to write well in the third person is an essential skill.

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    Written by MasterClass Last updated: Aug 24, 2021 • 4 min read As the author of a novel, you get to decide who tells your story. Writing in the third-person point of view is like hearing an announcer call a sporting event—a narrator gives a play-by-play of the plot from an outside perspective.

  4. Third Person Point of View: The 'He Said, She Said ...

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    1. Third Person Objective Point of View. The third person objective POV is a way to tell your story by giving the reader all the details within the scenes without including what is going on in the characters' minds. To write in the third person objective POV, you will need to create an unbiased narrator who doesn't tell the reader the ...

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    1. When should you write in third person point of view? It's best to write in the third person point of view when creatively or academically writing. When writing academically you should never use first-person pronouns, such as I, me, or my. This will make your work stand out of perspective, it will also make your work look more opinion-based.

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    What Is Third-Person Point Of View in Writing? In third-person point of view, the author is narrating a story about the characters, referring to them by name, or using the third-person pronouns "he," "she," and "they." The other points of view in writing are first person and second person. Articles Videos Instructors

  11. How to write in third-person

    6 tips for writing in third-person. 1. Understand your voice won't always shine in your essays. Every single piece of writing tends to have a voice or point of view as if you're speaking to the reader directly. However, that can't always happen in academic writing as it's objective compared to a novel, for example.

  12. Writing a book in third person point of view

    Here are some tips to keep in mind when writing in third person point of view: When writing in third person point of view, there are a few things you can do to make your story more interesting: Use descriptive language to paint a picture for your reader. This will help them visualize the events of the story and feel more invested in the characters.

  13. Multiple Points of View: 7 Tips for Writing from Different ...

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    Deep third-person point of view (POV)—also known as "close third"—is a narrative technique that combines elements of both limited-third and first-person perspectives. It offers a unique way of storytelling that can greatly enhance the reader's immersion in a story, which has made it increasingly popular in the current market.

  15. The Ultimate Guide to Third-Person Writing

    The third person is what you call it when someone writes a story from outside the action. On paper, that translates into using third-person pronouns (he, she, it, they) when talking about the characters in the story. There is more than one type of third person. Here are the three most common ones: 1. Third-person omniscient: third-person ...

  16. Writing in Third Person: How to, When to, and Why

    Writing in the third person point of view is when the writer tells the story using third-person pronouns like "he" or "she". It gives the story a more objective perspective and can be less confusing for the reader. When done well, it can make the story more engaging by giving the reader a different perspective on the events.

  17. How to Write in Third Person Properly

    Posted on Jan 25, 2022 Written by Gloria Russell Home > Blog > Fiction, Writing > How to Write in Third Person Properly Picking a point of view for your novel can be tricky. After all, point of view has an enormous impact on the reader's experience and on the meaning of the text itself.

  18. 6 Ways to Write in Third Person

    Method 1 Writing in Third Person Academically Download Article 1 Use third person for all academic writing. For formal writing, such as research and argumentative papers, use the third person. Third person makes writing more objective and less personal.

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  21. First Person vs. Third Person: How to Use Different Points of View

    When narrating fiction, authors traditionally choose between first-person point of view and third-person point of view ( second-person point of view is less common ). While first-person writing offers intimacy and immediacy between narrator and reader, third-person narration offers the potential for both objectivity and omniscience.

  22. How to Start a Novel in Third Person: 7 Tips

    8 Comments There is no basic formula for how to start a novel in third person. Yet working with third person POV presents specific choices, challenges and advantages. Here are 7 tips for beginning a book in third person: 1: Choose between third person limited, objective and omniscient

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    Third person seems to be common ground, for readers and writers. It is a space where most people are comfortable. You can divide third person into attached, omniscient and narrator. Third person attached gives you one person's perspective. You, attach the 'camera' to their shoulder and tell everything from their perspective.

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