Narrator

Popkey's narrator is an astute observer of the human condition, a graduate level student of literature, and a self-destructive woman. The conversations she has throughout the novel serve primarily to deepen her own sense of self, which she values over everything else in her life. She cheats on her husband out of radical self-hatred, and hates herself even more when her infidelity does not drive him to hate her too: "I was stuck with myself wasn't I, but here he was being given a chance to walk away and here he was squandering it" (94). By her own hand, Popkey's narrator ruins her own life: but she does so out of a sense of duty to authenticity, out of an extreme desire to be herself, however monstrous she may be.

Although her attempts to understand herself are as heroic as they are twisted, the narrator is insightful enough to...