Genre
Novel
Setting and Context
America and China
Narrator and Point of View
Third-person narrator
Tone and Mood
Wounding, uncertain, melancholy, and tumultuous
Protagonist and Antagonist
Deming Guo is the protagonist. Polly is the antagonist.
Major Conflict
Deming Guo’s unceremonious separation from his mother and the tumultuous life that follows.
Climax
Deming Guo reconnecting with his biological mother
Foreshadowing
Polly’s disappearance is a foreshadow of her long-term separation from Deming Guo.
Understatement
Peter's inherent prejudice makes him look down upon other races, such as the Mexicans.
Allusions
Allusion to contemporary immigration chaos and challenges
Imagery
Deming Guo’s circumstances plunge him into a traumatizing identity crisis.
Paradox
N/A
Parallelism
The protagonist has parallel identities: Deming Guo and Daniel Wilkinson.
Metonymy and Synecdoche
Ghosts denote haunting memories.
Personification
N/A
