Point of View

The short stories in How to Pronounce Knife alternate between first and third person narrators. Many feature adult narrators looking back on influential moments from their childhoods. “Randy Travis” and “Edge of the World” are both narrated in first person by a woman in her forties reflecting on her youth; both women can see, with the hindsight and wisdom that age brings, how much their mother was suffering. “A Far Distant Thing” and “Picking Worms” are both told by narrators remembering their teenage years through stories that highlight the different opportunities afforded to white people and Asian immigrants in a white-dominant society. “Chick-A-Chee!” and “Ewwrrkk” are written from the first person viewpoint of an adult recalling their childhood, but in these cases, the memories are relayed with bemused fondness rather than sadness.

The story “How to Pronounce Knife” is told from a third person limited...