Point of View

David Nicholls tells his novel "One Day" from the third-person and omniscient narrative. In order to accommodate the great distances and swift passage of time between Emma, Dexter, their maturation, and their encounters and the events of their lives, the third-person and omniscient narrative is engaged to provide a sense of stability. Over time, people change, their language change, and their thoughts and ideas can change. In the case of two dynamic characters like Emma and Dexter, the changes can be profound, and so to avoid confusing the reader with language that varies greatly in a first-person narrative, Nicholls uses a consistent, third-person and omniscient perspective.

Setting

While much of the plot of David Nicholl's novel "One Day" takes place around the world in far-flung places like Rome, India, and Paris, much of the novel occurs in England. In both ways, the settings work well to...