Point of View

Things We Lost to the Water is written from a third person free indirect point of view. Over the course of the novel, this third person narrator shifts between Hương's, Tuấn's, and Ben's perspectives. In the chapters labeled with the month and year, the narrator attends to all three family members' points of view within the same chaptered whole. In the chapters labeled with a character's name and the year, the narrator attends solely to the named character's vantage point. For example in the chapter "Hương, 1978," the narrator follows Hương's perspective as she describes Hương and her sons' first month in New Orleans. In one passage the narrator says, "She was lucky, she told herself. She was alive. She made it to America" (9). These lines originate from Hương's psyche and illustrate her attempts to remain grateful for her new...