Point of View

Spufford writes the novel in the third-person narration in the present tense. This immerses the reader in the characters' experiences and allows for a vicarious glimpse at a day in their life. Within the context of third-person narration, the narrator appears to focus on the details of the characters' lives as if looking through a microscope. This narrative distance prompts the reader to compare the characters as the novel progresses. Additionally, due to the narrator's philosophical musings through the novel, this point of view encourages the reader to consider the characters' behavior as representative of human behavior in general.

There are moments in the novel in which the reader is in the mind of the characters from a first-person point of view. These moments are indicated by italicized font most often, and allow the reader more insight into the characters' psyche than during the predominant...