Thursday, June 1, 2017

style - What is "head popping" and why is it bad?


Most of my writing experience has been with first person, nonfiction stories. Now I want to try some fiction. I'm working in third person, but I'm a little bit confused about how to pull something off.


Okay, say I'm telling the story from character A's POV and he's talking to character B, suddenly character A says something where I think it might be interesting if the reader were to know exactly what it is that character B is thinking and or feeling at that very moment in time that Character A said whatever he said.


Can I not just write a new sentence saying whatever it is I want the reader to know? Can I not just change the POV from sentence to sentence by simply indicating to the reader that Character A felt this. And then Character B felt this. And so on and so forth?


Is this not the purpose of the omniscient narrator?


I've been told I've got it wrong. I've heard the term "head popping." I guess my question is what is head popping. Is it a bad thing to do? If so, why is it bad? And by that I mean: How does it hurt the story?



Can anyone think of a good example of a popular book that uses this type of effect?




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