Guest Post - The Death of Us by Alice Kuipers

Today, I have the pleasure of having author Alice Kuipers here on the blog to talk about writing from multiple perspectives in her new novel, The Death of Us. So without further ado, here is what Alice had to say.

Today, I’m posting about writing a story from multiple perspectives. The Death of Us is written from the points of view of three main characters — Ivy, Kurt and Callie. The shift from one character to the next starts at the very beginning and follows that pattern throughout the novel. It was really tricky to write and there were times during the process that I wondered what I’d got myself into with this structure. Here are the three things that were most difficult:

1 — I had to make each character sound different and unique. If, at any point, they started to blur in my head, I had to step away front eh book and spend a bit of time with the character I was working on. I used character interviews and tried to think about how the story seemed from that character’s perspective. I could hear the characters in my head clearly if I made time to do this, so that helped, but it wasn’t always easy.

2 — The book also shifts through time and it wasn’t until a later draft that I realized keeping that as simple as possible was going to help me and a reader navigate this story. Now, I hope, it all works well, but moving from Kurt to Callie to Ivy WHILE not following a chronology made for some messy earlier drafts.

3 — Hardest of all was making each character feel like the star of their own story. As a writer, it’s natural to feel closer to one character, and, initially, that character was Callie. But as I redrafted, I started to really see the story from the points of view of Kurt and Ivy and I think that’s when the book finally came into focus.

All this to say, that the writing process was much harder than anything I’ve tried before. Although in my first book, Life on the Refrigerator Door, I shift from Claire to her mother in the notes they write to each other, jumping from two to three characters was infinitely more challenging. And even more fun. Once I got into it, the writing was exciting. I hope readers feel that excitement and natural tension on the page. There’s nothing more thrilling for a writer than the moments when the story begins to take off. All the hard work and character interviews and complications faded, and The Death of Us came to life. So, yes, it was hard work, but it was very satisfying.

If any of you are writers yourselves and you’re trying out multiple points of view, have a look at the character workshops I’ve posted on my website under Classroom. It might seem silly to know that your character loves sushi and doesn’t believe in the death penalty, but actually having all that texture and detail in your mind will make for a richer writing experience.

Thanks, Emilie, for hosting me today as The Death of Us heads out into the big wide world. It’s nerve-wracking and exciting having a new book out and I’m glad to make a stop with you on the blog tour. I really appreciate the support. 

And thank you to Alice Kuipers for taking the time to share insights on writing from multiple points of view. If you missed it earlier this morning, be sure to check out my review of The Death of Us to find out more about my thoughts on this fantastic book.

About the book:

A recovered friendship, a dark secret, and a love triangle with a deadly angle…

Callie is shocked when her friend Ivy reappears after an unexplained three-year absence, but the girls pick up where they left off, and suddenly Callie’s summer is full of parties, boys and fun. Beneath the surface, things aren’t what the seem, however, when a handsome boy with a dark past gets tangled up with Ivy, the girls’ history threatens to destroy their future.

About the author:

Alice Kuipers is the bestselling, award-winning author of three previous novels, Life on the Refrigerator Door, The Worst Thing She Ever Did and 40 Things I Want To Tell You, and the picture book Violet and Victor Write The Best-Ever Bookworm Book. Her work has been published to critical acclaim in twenty-nine countries. She lives in Saskatoon. Find her here: www.alicekuipers.com

Blog Tour - The Death of Us by Alice Kuipers

Title: The Death of Us

Author: Alice Kuipers

Publisher: HarperTrophy Canada

Release Date: September 2, 2014

Source: ARC from Publisher

Buy the Book: Amazon / Indigo / HarperCollins Canada

A recovered friendship, a dark secret, and a love triangle with a deadly angle…

Callie is shocked when her friend Ivy reappears after an unexplained three-year absence, but the girls pick up where they left off, and suddenly Callie’s summer is full of parties, boys and fun. Beneath the surface, things aren’t what they seem, however, and when a handsome boy with a dark past gets tangled up with Ivy, the girl’s history threatens to destroy their future.

I’m always intrigued by books that have a synopsis that doesn’t reveal much. That’s exactly what Alice Kuipers’ The Death of Us was. Despite it’s short length, this was a powerful novel, one that I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend to any contemporary lover out there.

After Ivy’s sudden departure, Callie never thought she would see her friend again. But three years later Callie can’t believe it when Ivy just shows up on her doorstep. It’s like no time has passed since Ivy left. The two fiends go back to things the way they were before everything happened. Before long, Callie finds herself going to parties and hanging out with boys, things she would never feel comfortable doing without Ivy by her side. But things with Ivy aren’t what they seem. There’s a lot more going on, and soon enough Ivy’s past is threatening to take away Callie’s future. 

Before being offered the opportunity to read and review The Death of Us, I hadn’t previously read any of Alice Kuipers’s books. I’ve realized now that was a mistake. If they are anything like The Death of Us was, they are definitely books I need to read. The Death of Us was an absolutely fantastic read, and one that was completely different from what I’ve been reading recently. This was a story that was told from multiple perspectives not just in terms of characters, but also in terms of timelines. The story starts off on one night, but soon after it jumps back in time and features the events of the two weeks leading up to that one night. It was a very interesting way to tell the story and it definitely kept me reading because I wanted to know what had happened that led the characters to where they are at the very start of the story. Which I know sounds like a weird thing to say, but it makes sense when you read the book. The Death of Us was also a very short story, barely over two hundred pages, but it packed a major punch. I don’t want to say too much because doing so would give too much away, but know that this a story that will most definitely surprise you.

It’s difficult to talk about the characters in this book because the whole time I was reading, there was a bit of a mystery surrounding each one of them. That is to say, that it wasn’t until the very end of the story that it became clear exactly what was going on with all of these characters. That didn’t stop me from enjoying reading it all from their perspectives, because I really did. I really enjoyed seeing Callie come into her own and figure out exactly who she was and who she wanted to be. Ivy kept me guessing the whole through the story, I just never knew what she was going to do next or whether she was being honest or not. And Kurt I just kept rooting for. It felt like I only got short glimpses of him, never enough to fully satisfy me. Until I finally got as much as I wanted and it pretty much gutted me. I didn’t know what to think anymore. But getting to read about Kurt the way I did because of it was completely worth it.

Alice Kuipers’s The Death of Us was an absolutely beautiful and powerful story. I enjoyed absolutely every page of this book and I am still trying to process everything that happened, days after I finished reading. If you are a contemporary love, I can’t recommend this story enough.