Skill Focus – POV & Head Hopping

Because if we’re in someone’s head, we shouldn’t be teleporting into someone else’s mid-paragraph.

✨ Welcome to the Perspective Control Tower

Point of View (POV) is your story’s emotional camera.
It tells us whose experience we’re living, what they notice, and how they interpret the world.

But when you accidentally switch cameras without warning?

📍That’s called head hopping—and it confuses the reader, weakens emotional tension, and breaks immersion.

Let’s fix it.

🧠 What Is POV (and What Is Head Hopping)?

Point of View (POV):
The lens through which your reader experiences the scene.

  • First Person: “I did this.”

  • Close Third Person: “She did this,” but with her internal voice and filter.

  • Omniscient: God’s-eye narrator. Knows everything. Rare and tricky.

Head Hopping:
Suddenly switching between two characters’ thoughts or emotions without a clear break.

“Sarah frowned. She didn’t trust him. Jake noticed her frown and worried she might leave.”

👎 That’s head hopping—because we just jumped from Sarah’s thoughts to Jake’s feelings in one beat.

🛠️ Try This Rewrite Drill

Here’s a head-hoppy sentence:

“Mia tensed as he walked in. She wondered if he remembered. Mark was relieved to see her again—he’d missed her terribly.”

Your challenge: pick ONE POV to stick with and revise accordingly.

  • If Mia’s POV: show her perception of Mark’s relief.

  • If Mark’s POV: show what he thinks she looks like—not what she actually thinks.

💡 Tip: You can hint at another character’s mood—but only through observable clues, not internal thoughts.

🧪 Quillwyn’s POV Check

Ask yourself:

  • Is the reader inside one character’s skin right now?

  • Did I just jump into someone else’s internal state?

  • Can I reframe this from the original character’s observations?

If you want to switch POVs, do it with a scene break or chapter shift. Give readers time to reorient.

🎯 Bonus: POV Creates Intimacy

When you stay rooted in one character’s lens:

  • Emotion hits harder

  • Tension sharpens

  • Descriptions gain personality

You don’t lose richness—you gain depth.

💬 Need Help? Ask Quillwyn!

Paste a scene and say:

“Can you help me spot head hopping or keep the POV consistent?”

She’ll gently walk through it with you—no whiplash required.