This post was originally published in June 2015 and updated in January 2022.

There are several perfectly good ways to structure a story in terms of viewpoint, but (probably) the more common ones are:

• A single first-person narrator, as in Florence and Giles or 600 Hours of Edward.
• A main third-person narrator plus occasional omniscient narration, as in Harry Potter.
• Several third-person narrators, as in The Song of Ice and Fire series, some getting considerably more “screen time” than others.

A slightly more unusual choice is to use two (or more) first person narrators. Here are a few examples:

Gentlemen & Players by Joanne Harris – the narrative is divided between two first-person narrators; the identity of one of these is concealed, though hinted at.

The Chaos Walking trilogy by Patrick Ness – a particularly interesting one as the first book has one first-person narrator, the second book has two, and the third book has three.

The Help by Kathryn Stockett – with three first-person narrators, Aibileen, Minny, and Skeeter, all with a different voice.

Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn – with two first-person narrators, their narratives combining to give two sides of the story.

Me Before You by Jojo Moyes – this one is much less of a “split” narrative as it has one main narrator (Lou) and occasional brief chapters from other first-person narrators (Treena, Camilla Traynor, and Nathan) as well as a third-person prologue

Those are all first person examples. Of course there are plenty of third-person narratives split between multiple viewpoint characters, too, but these often use the omniscient viewpoint or follow some characters a lot more than others. A good third-person example that works in a similar way to the first person ones above is my friend Nick Bryan’s Hobson & Choi series, where the third-person limited viewpoint switches back and forth between the two titular characters.

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