My Irritation Towards Perspective Changes

Perspective changes are probably one of the most common things in literature. Which is why it is incredibly important that they are done right, however, some people haven't gotten the memo, which is why I'm here to spell it out.

There are two things I hate in books, when the author writes the exact same book in another character's point of view and when the author changes perspectives halfway through the series, say adding a second perspective or just transitioning to a different character altogether. 

Books that are rewrites of another book but in another character's perspective are very hit or miss with me. Usually, I hate them.

I feel like a lot of these stories don’t add anything new to the original novel by having these new perspectives. For example, I love Jennifer L. Armentrout’s books, but she decided to rewrite Obsidian in Daemon’s point of view, and it was just that, Obsidian from Daemon’s point of view. There was nothing that we didn’t already know or any secret revelations that lead us deeper into Daemon’s inner workings, it was just him telling us what happened and I honestly could have gone without reading it. 

However, I do have to admit that Colleen Hoover’s Losing Hope was a rare exception as I think it gave us a lot of what we didn’t and couldn’t get out of Hopeless. It showed Dean’s side of things, the years he went without Sky, and in that case, it was a completely important part of the series. Also, I would like to add that if Richelle Mead ever decided to write the Vampire Academy from Dimitri’s point of view I would be the first in line to read it. What these two examples have in common is that these other characters are not open books, they have lots of secrets and a lot of the time you aren’t quite sure what they are thinking or what their motivations are, in these cases I would definitely love a book written from a separate point of view. However, most books aren’t like this. 

As for when the perspective changes halfway through the series it just doesn’t flow that well. I can understand if that book is another character's story all together but is just part of the same series, but if the book is just shifting over to say, the love interests point of view just for their input, I can’t stand it. Unless I hated the original protagonist, which I rarely do, then I don’t want a shift in character perspective.

Thoughts?

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