Thread: Head Hopping

Wait, wait, wait I enjoyed the lesson, it was very nice and informative, but not saying I'm a professional anything dealing with writing, but the whole Linda tossed her long, black hair, I didn't see much wrong with that. I get where your going with it, to me it sounds completely absurd if it was in first person I tossed my long, black hair, but in third, I didn't think there was a problem. I hate first person, for starters, so lets get that out of the way, but in third, I like to think of my story as, say, the person reading is a God, or rather, the words that's to be read is like a God looking down into this world I'm writing. I completely get it if I was to write about a guy name John who goes around solving mysteries and live his daily life, with me as the writer portraying it as if it was first person only written in third person format, but I think third person is the best ever time to explain things that the character may not knowpay attention to themselves. So, for me to write that Linda tossed her hair, and describe the color, I'm not saying the story is written in Linda's point of view, I'm just being the narrator. Let's say Linda slips on a tiled floor due to a banana peal, with your method, I'd probably write, Linda's foot moved forward, only to fall back from her shoe making contact with a slippery surface. Looking up to see what she tripped over, it was a banana peel that caused the embarrassing scene. Which is perfectly fine, but I don't think it would be a problem to write Linda's foot moved forward, though it caught on a banana peel, causing her to fall back. Looking up to see what she tripped over, she saw the offending garbage that caused the embarrassing scene. -- would that be head hopping? Seeing as I indicated that there was a banana peel to trip over before Linda herself could look down to see what tripped her? If so, I say nay to your rule of no Head Hopping! I've seen many books some published professionally, some not, written in third person and explained a matter that the main character should not have been aware of yet or just shouldn't be thinking about, with your hair color example, and reading it seemed just fine, even witty and creative. Now, not to say my standards of reading materials is expert, and that I only accept nothing but the finest of golds, but I don't really think this Head Hopping, to a certain extent if I'm not misinterpreting, is an all around bad thing. I'll agree, in some cases it might make for better writing, but sometimes I find myself annoyed when a person try to build up suspense and have me feeling just as clueless as the character I don't want to be the character, I want to be the person watching a movie! I get it, don't tell me that it was the stepmother who did it in the beginning of the story by showing her stab the father, but the main character already have an advantage since he knows the stepmother personally, so at least give me the advantage of seeing her slip her hand under the couch like she's hiding the murder weapon for all I know she could just be hiding her wallet! Looking for change? do you get what I'm saying? Think of if this book was a movie, the main character might not have seen the step mother toss a knife out the window as he turned at the sound of a phone ringing, but me on the couch watching did! I like my books like I like my movies, Linda can go on flipping her black hair, it's not me flipping my hair, so the narrator can tell me all it wants what this Linda girl looks like. Don't get me wrong, I do find it annoying when someone describes their character to the extreme Linda flipped her long, black hair, with her pale white hand, blinking her green eyes. Yes, it's clever, I might do it in an RP if I don't have a picture to describe my character Though only because this is a world my RP partner is helping me with, heshe doesn't know what my character looks like, so I have to tell them somehow so they wont feel lost and give my person a trait shehe doesn't have, but I get how winded it can make a person. This is maxed ten times more annoying when in first person, me just thinking of replacing her with Is and Mys makes me want to gnaw my gums off Impossible, but I'll find a way to make it happen.