It varies from story to story. Sometimes, a story idea comes to me in a character’s voice, which lends itself to first-person POV. Other times the idea comes to me visually, like an image or scene from a movie, which is more easily conveyed in third-person POV. My preference when reading is third-person close POV. It’s like the best of both worlds.
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Personally I prefer third person POV. I have read books written in third person with multiple POVs that were good, but I think you need to really know your characters and have them speak in a very characteristic/highly distinguishable way. Books written in first person are fine, even if, personally, sometimes it feels like I’m way too inside the character’s head and the story is too slow.
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First person because of internal thoughts and feeling more personal. The reader experiences everything as if it’s happening to them instead of happening to someone else.
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Horses for courses? Just depends on what’s the best way for the story to get told? I’m trialling several options myself.
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This is advice I’m definitely going to take for myself. Use 1st person in my head to gain the right intimacy. I love it! Thanks.
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This was the first time I’d ever told anyone about the technique. Great it resonates with you too! 
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I agree that some genres lend themselves to particular POVs. Sometimes POV goes in or out of style. For instance, first person seems to be the popular POV for YA these days. I write Regency romance. The perennial favorite for that subgenre is alternating close third. I can’t think of any Regencies that have been written in first person, but if anyone knows of any, please drop the titles. I’m very curious.
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As I understand it, Narrative Voice(narrator) is how the story is told: 1st person, 2nd, or 3rd(and its myriad incarnations). Point of view(POV) is through whose eyes, or over which shoulder. I am reading a story up for submission and it has 3rd person-distant narrative voice, but has multiple POVs.
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Daniel_0227, that is a really interesting distinction you pointed out. I hadn’t thought of it in quite that way (Narrative voice = how and POV = who). Because I write in close third, the narrative voice is that of the POV character because everything is filtered through that character’s senses. As a result, when I work with alternating close third, the narrative voice changes. What I’m striving for is to make the author disappear leaving only the character and their thoughts on the page. But I would like to know more about the distinction you’ve pointed out. It could be something I’m not (and should be) more aware of.
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"How could he do this to me and for that tramp with a stamp?" I feel this view is the strongest POV to connect emotionally. The writer puts themselves into the character’s shoes and wears them down.
He would soon leave me but it was because of that tramp. This is also visceral in many ways.
Shiela watched Doug put his arms around the tramp nearby. Done right this 3rd person close POV is sometimes the hardest to achieve. You have to remember to only look out of Shielas eyes. You could also mention 3rd person close present which is just difficult to write and read. Sheila watches Doug slide his arm around the tramp as they leave.
Sheila couldn’t believe it. That tramp was here.
Doug couldn’t stop the grin that grew on his face as he wraps his arms around his sweetheart Jessica.
Jessica looked back at Sheila and winked. Pretty easy and you just have to keep the POV straight
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Those are excellent examples. I’m scoring a number of short stories for a magazine and a lot of the writers are using close 3rd, omni, and even present tense to afford some immediacy. But it’s hard. It’s hard to pick out just what’s not quite working, and harder still, I think, to make it work. Thank you!
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I read a book the other day that was 3rd person Omniscient and it was a little difficult to read. But the plot was great and the characters were falling in love . So I kept at it. But on a review I would have said, uggg 3rd person Omniscient.
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