Point of View

A Council of Dolls is written from many different first person perspectives. Part 1 of the novel is told from the perspective of Sissy, the daughter of Lillian and Cornelius. While Part 1 is about Sissy, it is also, in large part, also about Lillian. The first person perspective, therefore, makes the telling of Lillian’s adulthood notable because all the reader knows is told through the eyes of her young child. At this point, the reader is well aware of Sissy’s feelings and thoughts, but most of the action occurs around Lillian, and her perspectives cannot be completely taken into consideration because no child can fully understand an adult.

In Part 2, the point of view switches to that of Lillian, but now Lillian is a child. This offers the reader two different perspectives. First of all, the reader learns what happened to Lillian as a...