Realistic dialogue is a noteworthy feature of the novel, and Leonard has said that he got "lots of good Mafia dialogue" from the 1983 Philadelphia crime commission's report. He tries a significantly new narrative technique in the novel, presenting an episode from a variety of points of view: "I would write it from one character's point of view and then switch around and do the same scene again from another character's point of view and find that it had a lot more life in it, that it was a little more dramatic, more colorful, more interesting. I'm going to continue to do that."