Point of View

"The Deal of a Lifetime" is written from the first person point of view of an unnamed narrator. The author complicates his narrator’s first person account with the use of the direct address. The story opens with the lines, "Hi. It's your dad" (7). These lines not only establish the intimate narrative tone, but inform the reader that the narrator is a father, and that the remainder of the story will appear in the form of a message to his son. Because the narrator has been largely estranged from his son for many years, the narrator conveys a wealth of details about his life and experience throughout the story. The father and son's distanced relationship allows these details to appear organically on the page. Therefore, the reader and the narrator's son are learning about the narrator's life and experience at the same time. For example...