Point of View

America Fantastica is told entirely from a shifting third-person perspective, which occasionally but infrequently inhabits a limited view and more often operates in a more omniscient frame. Given that the novel in many ways functions as survey of different walks of American life and their reactions to the absurdities and phenomena of the Trump-era United States, this shifting perspective allows O'Brien to bounce from one point of view to another in order to offer a plethora of insights on the nature of American politics during this period of time. The ever-shifting perspective of the novel also creates a constant sense of change, motion, and uncertainty that is meant to mimic the particular turbulence of this period.

Although the novel is deeply critical of Donald Trump's would-be voter base (all of the novel's characters could hypothetically belong to it), O'Brien also seeks to find a means...