Getting into the minds of your characters?

LOL rollin, but I'm not sure if your 50SOG example proves my view or the opposing view better. She was 'successful' (financially) with her audience of mostly panting, panty-moist wannabes who never experienced actual D/s. Those with experience that I know have skewered her book as nonsense.

in golf we have a saying, kdpierre -- "sometimes it's better to be lucky than good."

I think it is very much a matter of personal taste, also of trial and error.

There is a great deal of reading material in The Library. Maybe it will be a matter of finding authors whose writing reflects this specific requirement of character development and psychological detail.

I agree very much with the sentiment expressed in the question, since access to the characters' minds plays an enormous part in creating enjoyment of the the drama as it is portrayed in the story.

When shifting POVs, one good trick is to use ***. For example.

Jennifer's heart was in her mouth. She couldn't believe he has said that, actually told her that she would need to drop her panties. A glance at the front door confirmed that it was locked, so no one would interrupt them. She knew that the houses in this development were environmentally sealed, mostly for climate control, but all that insulation all kept sounds inside. She remembered all the times there had been music blaring in this house, and Jennifer hadn't heard a peep until the front door opened.
The locked front door. Jennifer knew that it didn't need a key, that she could run to the door, unlock it, and flee, and that he wouldn't even try to stop her if she did. But if she did that...
Jennifer didn't make a conscious decision, but suddenly words were spilling from her mouth.
"But I'm wearing shorts." Jennifer said, pointing out something that only a blind man could miss. "Not a skirt."
"Then they'd have to come down too."
Jennifer swallowed hard, then started to undo the front of her shorts.
***
Robert put down his drink, the third of the day, missing the coaster as he did. If it hadn't been the third drink of the day then he wouldn't have have bothered responding when his niece's friend teased him. It had been three years since he spanked his niece, and he had no idea how Jennifer had heard about that event and wanted to tease him while he house sat.
Three years? No, it had to be more. Robert wasn't sure just how long ago it had been, but no one had batted an eye over the bare bottom spanking he had given her. The girl was now in university, so it had be longer ago, because people would have batted an eye if he had spanked a high school student's bottom, bared or not. Maybe it was five or six...
Robert tried to do the mental math as he watched Jennifer undo her shorts and, after a long pause, pull them to her knees. He could tell that she wasn't drawing things out to tease, that she was still deciding if she was going to allow him to show her what a real spanking felt like. Robert knew if that happen it would be a mistake, but he couldn't find the words to tell the college girl that he had been joking. Part of him hoped that Jennifer would call off this game, but most of him was praying that she wouldn't.



There. We have a switch in the POV, and because of the *** it is plain that the text has undergone a change.

Hi GG, I have never heard of using *** to change POV before. Is it a widely recognised 'author' thing?? I change POV all the time in my writing (especially in my longer novelettes) yet I have never made a clear indication before doing so.

I just assume that beginning the new paragraph with "Robert........" instead of "Jennifer....." was a clear enough sign as to whose perspective it was?

I have learnt something new today!

XxxX

There are no hard and fast rules about point of view. There was a comment that jumping between 1st and 3rd person without some sort of demarcation is confusing, and that's certainly true, but a point of view is only 1st person if the subject of the sentence, the narrating voice, is "I." You can establish a character's point of view in the 3rd person, as Goodgulf does with "Robert" and "Jennifer" above. With 3rd person omniscient, it's permissible to jump from one point of view to another, but one advantage of sticking with a point of view is that it allows the reader to identify with that character, that perspective on a scene. Those are the stories that tend to dwell most on a characters thoughts and feelings, as opposed to observing the characters' actions from the outside.

It's worth remembering, too, that the act of spanking between adults lends itself to that mental dimension. The best spanking scenes in real life are when the spanker and the spankee are each in touch with what the experience is like for the other. The top has to imagine what the bottom is feeling in order to orchestrate the bottom's experience and the bottom has to believe the top is deriving pleasure from the experience or it all falls apart.

What Goodgulf illustrated is the way I do it, with ****. I try to keep it pretty much one person's scene but there are times when it seems important to know what both parties are thinking, especially as a new relationship is being formed and the characters are falling in love (or lust) or it's a brand new experience. But there are also times when it is useful to have the other party to an event be a cipher, be mysterious. This is especially true in the romance genre where it's mostly about the heroine anyway.

Yes, in all my published writing days (for sale) I've been told by the publishers (short stories and in novels alike), that it's the asterisks. I use an asterisk then 3 spaces, asterisk then 3 spaces, asterisk. Four together is another way the publishers like it. It's not only a character change, it's a scene change as well. The LSF knows we're looking for a scene change even with ---- like that. I believe that's in the author help. Many authors these days just use another chapter. Boy did we get off topic or what?

I recommend The Whip that Saved Venice, a historical event involving King Henri V of France and Veronica Franco, a courtesan of Venice and Poetess. He was raised to enjoy pain by the nurse that raised him. He job was to satisfy Venice by delivering enough ships to discourage the Ottomans from invading Venice. There are two parts, each character tells the story of their encounter in their own voice. Their pain, pleasure and feelings abound. Knottypine and I collaborated on the story and I was able to request and read her poetry from the archives of our state library system as well as thoroughly research the event.
Islandcarol

I'm another one who uses the **** to indicate a shifting POV.