top of the stairs, her son John next to her. Clinging to the handrail, she planted her trembling foot on the first step. But the other foot caught on the carpet and . . . Third Person Point of View, Controlled Consciousness - This is probably the easiest point of view for a beginning writer to use. Like first person, we see all the action through the eyes of a single character, and we can only see what that character sees. The difference is we use "he" or "she" instead or "I" or "we": John knew he shouldn't have allowed his grandmother to go down the stairs alone. She wasn't steady on her feet and sometimes she grabbed onto the nearest object when dizziness overwhelmed her . When using a controlled consciousness point of view, we choose one character to experience our story through. This character is called our viewpoint character. However, we can have more than one viewpoint character in a novel. Preferably, the viewpoint character should change only at chapter or scene breaks and should never change without good reason. More discussion on how to do this follows the detailed examples. Third Person Omniscient - God-like; the narrator knows and sees everything, and can move from one mind to another. John stood next to his grandmother. He wanted to help her down the stairs. Mrs. Smith looked at her grandson, her blue eyes sharp, and moved a strand of hair from her face. She was determined to do