Point of View

The novel is narrated by an objective third-person narrator in the past tense. The narrator keeps a close eye on Beth, but stays slightly removed from her emotions. This narrative choice seems in-line with Beth as a character, since she is distant and removed from her own emotions.

The novel begins with a declaration of Beth’s mother’s death: “Beth learned of her mother’s death from a woman with a clipboard. The next day her picture appeared in the Herald-Leader. The photograph, taken on the porch of the gray house on Maplewood Drive, showed Beth in a simple cotton frock. Even then, she was clearly plain” (3). As soon as the narrator tells readers about the death, however, he immediately moves on to the next day in order to examine the photograph in the newspaper. Rather than examining Beth’s internal emotions, the probable...