Point of View

The novel’s constantly shifting point of view is one of its most apparent, noteworthy, and intriguing stylistic elements. The writing constantly shifts back and forth between the perspectives of the various characters, at times recounted in first person and at other times recounted in third person. There is the very clear sense that there is both a thematic and a narrative reason for this: to look at the latter first, it very much sets up an unpredictability, a fluidity of perspective that keeps the reader both interested and on his/her toes. The reader never really knows whose perspective is going to appear next, what that perspective is going to be, and what it might mean for the overall work. It’s a constant layering of information, one idea or intuition or feeling on top of another, that serves to illuminate the novel’s...