Point of View

"Half Broke Horses" by Jeannette Walls is written in the first-person point of view, through the eyes of the main character, Lily Casey Smith. The use of first person in the story works well in that the reader is able to understand the modern world of a woman living in a man's world, particularly as it pertains to ranching and breaking horses, which is Lily's specialty. The use of the first person makes the story seem slightly less unusual as Lily seems to take all things in stride even when those things are quite dramatic and sometimes shocking to the average man or woman at the time. There are no limits to what Lily Casey Smith can do or is willing to do from the time she saved her siblings from a flash flood to the time she decided that she wanted to learn how to...