Carl Streator

Carl Streator is the narrator of the book. Streator is a writer for a newspaper who is given an assignment to write five feature articles about five different families who experienced the sudden death of an infant. While working this story, Streator comes to realize that each of these infants were read the same poem before their deaths, a culling song that was originally designed to end the suffering of children during famine and warriors on the battlefield. As Streator investigates this connection between the multiple deaths, he begins to realize that this song will kill anyone the person reading, or reciting, the poem aims it toward.

As the plot continues to develop, the reader learns that Streator himself once had a wife and child who died. Streator read this same poem to both his wife and daughter in the hopes of getting a good night's sleep...