From the very beginning of his career innovative techniques have been as important to Barth as action and character. Although some of Barth's techniques are almost excruciatingly obvious in The Tidewater Tales (such as naming Peter and Katherine's boat Story), in this novel Barth brings the self-conscious narrative to a new level of complexity at the same time he renders it less obscure and more pleasurable to the general reader. To such conventional suspense questions as Will the CIA harm Peter or his family?

Barth adds such questions as How will Peter and Katherine create the suspense required to make the CIA plot properly chilling to the reader? As readers we move forward not only to find out, for example, who this "Odysseus" character is but also how Peter/Katherine are going to handle this violation of verisimilitude.

Barth uses practically every device imaginable to draw attention to...