Barker’s narrator is a character we can relate to: she talks to herself. The running dialogues most of us keep internal, she speaks out loud, narrating the story of herself suspecting her husband of cheating on her. This fascinating method creates a work full of complex, rounded characters and dramatic scenes.
The stories she tells are each spurred by events in the ‘real’ life of the main plot. These stories develop the other characters, explain relationships between characters, and advance the plot. For instance, the storyteller’s daughter mentions the mother of one of her school friends. Barker’s character narrates a huge story about a complex relationship between that mother and a younger man, a story tingling with the potential for violence, both adolescent and mature at the same time, and ending with a tremendous surprise that leaves the reader reinterpreting the story’s previous events.
In another story, she imagines her son and his friend breaking into a large estate home. Her imaginings of their relationship are almost fanciful, maybe wild, but penetrating and entirely believable. She weaves what she knows about her son and his friend, and about confused and unrestrained adolescence, into a magnificent and memorable tale.
These stories within the main story are meaningful and poignant themselves; but, they way they explain and further the greater plot structure is amazing. Barker expertly uses this narrative structure to create a novel full of complex characters and significant happenings. She even ends the work with a surprise. This incredible and unique work is a strong example of purposeful writing that demonstrates the characteristics of good narration.
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