Loss and Grief

Samuel’s death at the novel’s start launches the novel’s explorations of loss and grief. Although protagonist and first person narrator Mamush has “known for years that Samuel [is his] father,” he has grown up regarding him as his “mother’s close childhood friend” (4). Treating Samuel “something like an uncle” instead of as his father inspires Mamush to mentally detach from him, even when he passes away (4). He maintains a cool, unemotional narration throughout the early chapters of the novel, a narrative tone which enacts Mamush’s reluctance to own his own grief. At the same time, Mamush’s imagined conversations with Samuel after he discovers his death capture Mamush’s sorrow and his difficulty reconciling with losing Samuel.

Over the course of the novel, Mamush’s alleged journey to discover the truth of what happened to Samuel is in fact his...