Point of View

This story is told from the point of view of an omniscient third-person narrator with a focus on Mitsuki. The events of the novel are narrated through Mitsuki’s perspective, along with her emotions, thoughts, and memories. The novel begins at a dividing point in Mitsuki’s life, the death of her mother. The novel branches off this reference point of Noriko’s death with some branches of the story reaching into the recent past to talk about Noriko’s sickness, and some branches reaching further back to discuss Noriko’s mother’s life. Branches of the story also reach into the future to talk about Mitsuki and her sister’s attempts to grieve and come to terms with their mother’s death.

The narrator knows and narrates what Mitsuki knows at any given point in the novel. For instance, in the period of time...