The Secret Keeper Literary Elements

A novel, detective, thriller

The actions are developed in two time periods at the same time: London during World War II and London of 2011.

It is third-person narration

The tone and mood is rather sad, many awful events of the war and bombing are touched in the novel. Also the story of Vivien, a woman, who has been constantly severely beaten by her husband adds to the atmosphere notes of sympathy and attraction. But still the main line of the story – Laurel’s investigation of her mother’s past, and of events of the far 1963 year, when her Laurel witnessed her mother killing a man, keeps the novel in disturbing tone.

Vivien, Dorothy and Laurel are the main characters of the novel. Vivien’s husband, the man Laurel’s mother killed, is the protagonist.

The main conflict of the novel is that people very rarely really know those they love. On the example of Laurel’s mother Dorothy the author shows this. All her life Laurel thought she knew her mother very well, though they never were close enough, but the only event of the far past gave Laurel a feeling that she does not know all. Her investigation brings her to the biggest lie, but at the same time this lie is the biggest benefit.

The climax comes when Laurel finds all the truth and they have a long and sincere talk with her mother.

The novel is filled with foreshadowings of different kinds, which is characteristic for a detective novel.

The place of Laurel’s father in the life of her mother is undrstated and not developed good enough to understand his importance.

The novel alludes to the events of World War II.

Images of nature and the countryside, and of London during the war, are present in the novel.

The paradox and the biggest tragedy of the war is that people can easily be erased from the surface of the world and live on in the lives of other people.

The events are described in two parallel time periods.

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