Narrator and point of view
The short story “Frida Boyelski’s Shiva” by Abigail Ulman is a third-person narration in which the narrator is focused on Frida, the main character. The narrator has access to Frida’s thoughts and feelings but not to those of the other characters. The narrator only presents the actions and words of other characters from Frida’s point of view.
For example, the narrator describes how Frida observes the decorations in Ruthie’s room. Here, the narrator also suggests that Frida reconsiders her past choices:
(...) Ruthie’s little-girl desk, the little-girl bed, and the little-girl wallpaper covered in flowers that Frida had picked out years ago, because it had seemed like a good idea at the time – like immigrating, like getting married, like staying in th...