Point of View

Yewande Omotoso tells her novel The Woman Next Door in the third-person omniscient perspective from the point of view of an unknown narrator. The narrator’s omniscience allows the narrator to reveal the innermost thoughts, feelings, pains, dreams, hopes, fears, and worries of the two main characters, Hortensia and Marion. This gives the reader a unique insight into both women, which matters tremendously early on in the novel as neither woman speaks openly about herself. The narrator becomes the sole source of privileged information, creating a complex depth to both Marion and Hortensia. The narrator ultimately becomes irrelevant by the end of the novel in this regard, as Hortensia and Marion begin to speak to one another openly and honestly about themselves and those things kept inside. As a result, the reader has a more human perspective of Marion and Hortensia long before Hortensia and...