The memoir is told in first person, present tense from Alexandra Bobo Fuller's point of view. The main character is a child at the beginning of the story, and the perceptions are immersed in that character. For example, Bobo's mother habitually carries an Uzi, a machine gun manufactured in Israel. Bobo refers to it phonetically as an oozie, because that is how she understood the word as a child. This matter-of-fact attitude extends to terrorists, land mines, and the revolution going on all around them. Bobo accepts lessons in delivering a baby or treating wounds if all the grownups are dead, with childlike practicality.