Point of View

The novel is written in first-person, with each chapter following one character. The main protagonist is Mary, however the chapters are occasionally written from Kurt, Matheson, or various other girlfriends' perspectives. The novel alternates between the past and present tense, providing background of Mary and Kurt's lives before meeting each other and beginning the experiment, somewhat providing a rationale for some of their behaviors.

The many points of view as well as the timeline spanning character histories and present realities serves to underscore their narratives of personal growth because readers are able to understand more about their individual psychologies as well as how their past experiences manifest themselves in the present. The different perspectives mostly contradict themselves when the story is told from the point of view of the girlfriends as compared to Kurt. This distinction occurs because Kurt, the orchestrator of the experiment, believes...