Grief

Throughout the novel, the author traces Benny’s and Annabelle’s responses to Kenji’s death in order to explore the manifold ways in which grief might impact the individual. In the opening section of the novel, “Home,” the narrator attempts to articulate the ways in which Kenji’s passing has impacted his wife and young son. “The change [in Benny] was subtle, but [he] seemed to shrink as Annabelle grew, as if she were metabolizing her small son’s grief along with her own. Yes. That seems right. So, perhaps the voices started around then, too, shortly after [Kenji] died” (7)? Although the third person narrator has control of the narrative’s unfolding, this passage conveys the narrator’s uncertainty concerning the primary characters’ emotional conditions. They guess that the voices in Benny’s head are attributable to his loss, and that his mother’s concurrent...