Point of View

The novel is written from the first-person point of view of the main character Diamond Newberry. All of the chapters set in either 1980 or 1987 are presented from Diamond’s perspective and therefore trace sequences from her life as a child in the past or her life as a teenager in the present. Diamond’s first person narrative voice is at once assured and questioning. In the prologue, she sets out to tell her story in her own words, insisting that it “isn’t a mystery or a legend,” but “a story about leaving” that “starts with [her] body” (5). Over the course of the chapters that follow, Diamond alternates between presenting segments from her life in Swift River at 16 years old and those from her life in Swift River at eight years old.

In the chapters set in 1987, Diamond’s voice is more confident because she...