Point of View

The Book of Longings is written from Ana's first person point of view. Over the course of the novel, Ana recounts the events of her life beginning from when she is 14 years old, living in Sepphoris with her parents, through her adult life in Nazareth, Alexandria, and the Therapeutea community. By writing the novel from Ana's first person vantage, the author enacts Ana's work to claim her own voice, and to tell her story with her own words. On the first page of the novel, Ana says: "All my life, longings lived inside me, rising up like nocturnes to wail and sing through the night" (3). Ana's narrative, therefore, is a composition of these same longings. The novel is Ana's detailed account not only of her life's events, but of her life's desires, and her work to understand and pursue them.

When Ana is young, she...