Point of View

The 11 short stories collected in Wednesday’s Child are all written from the third person point of view. The only exception to this rule is the collection’s final story, “All Will Be Well,” which is written from the first person point of view of the unnamed narrator. Although Li relies upon the third person point of view throughout the collection, this narrative stance accomplishes an array of narrative effects depending on each particular story. For example, the third person limited point of view employed in “Wednesday’s Child” enacts the protagonist Rosalie’s struggle to reconcile with who she was as a mother to her late daughter Marcie. The third person limited narrative vantage point resurfaces in stories including “A Sheltered Woman,” “Hello, Goodbye,” “A Small Flame,” and “A Flawless Silence.” The protagonists of these stories, as well as others, tend “to remain silent...