Banks writes in a clear, blunt style with little adornment. Her chapters are relatively short (eight to ten pages) and somewhat episodic and self-contained.

Nearly each has its mini-adventure, revelation, climax and new question to be answered. The abrupt, self-contained nature of Banks's chapters sometimes makes even the "realistic" portions of her story seem a trifle artificial. For example, the first chapter, which is filled with enough unsettling events to keep anyone awake, ends with Roger's entering what is clearly a "haunted" little room and calmly falling asleep to await the next day's adventures. Similarly, when, after Roger's family has decided to adopt Melusine and take her back to England with them, she suddenly disappears, the characters—especially Roger's parents—seem surprisingly unperturbed and, after only the most cursory kind of search, travel along to England without her. Thus, Banks's somewhat disconnected and episodic...