Point of View

The point of view of this novel is first person. The narrator is Art Croft, a young cowboy who has just come into town after spending a long winter watching over a herd of cows. The first person point of view shows the events that unfold in the plot from Art's point of view only. This is a tightly restricted point of view, showing the events from the sideline rather than from the point of view of the other people who populate the novel.

The point of view is very narrow in this novel, but it works well with the plot because Art takes part in almost all of the events that are important to the overall plot. The reader sees the mob build and become convinced of the need to counter vigilante justice, but does not see the murder that is the catalyst to the...