Point of View

The story is told from the first-person, past-tense perspective of narrator and protagonist Queenie. That perspective is defined, in general, by several personal qualities – her being young (25), black (of Jamaican ancestry), and living in England (specifically: the racially-volatile Brixton district of London). Her general perspective is also define by what she experienced as something of a traumatic childhood – having been abandoned by her biological father (a black man) and abused by the man her mother subsequently became involved with (another black man). Her present-day perspective as she begins telling her story is defined by circumstances that have occurred more recently – the troubles in her relationship with her white boyfriend, and a miscarriage as a result of an unexpected pregnancy.

All these personal qualities and situations relate to the book’s central themes. Its two primary considerations relate to the experience of being black in a...