Arrow of God can be viewed as instrumental in establishing Achebe's style for he extensively revised it ten years after its first publication. In it he refined techniques used in his earlier work Things Fall Apart. Bruce King sees Achebe's so-called "structural" revisions as refinements that unify the novel through the vision of the main character. According to other critics, the novel has also become less concerned with explaining Igbo culture to westerners. Yet vivid scenes that depict Igbo life and customs, especially those centering on marriage, the harvest, and healing, give the novel a marvelously immediate sense of place.

With the exception of some flashbacks and shifts of scene to the outpost of the British officials, the narrative follows a fairly straight chronological line. But throughout the fairly simple arrangement of plot and scene, the actions and reactions of the characters are put to the test by...