Point of View

The novel is told through the point of view of both Harrison Shepherd and Violet Brown. The parts of the narrative told from Harry’s point of view include a chapter deliberately written as a memoir, several diaries covering different periods of his life, as well as correspondence with others, most often Frida Kahlo. The sections told from Violet’s perspective are written in retrospect after the apparent “death” of Harrison Shepherd. Violet’s character plays a role similar to that of an omniscient narrator because, unlike the reader or Harry himself, she knows how the story will end from the moment she begins writing. Harry, by contrast, writes the sections from his perspective at the time that the events are actually happening and therefore has no sense of what is to come later in his life.

The use of point of view in the...