Narrator and point of view

The short story “So Much Water So Close to Home” by Raymond Carver is told by a first-person narrator, Claire, who is also the main character of the story. 

The narrator only knows what she is being told by Stuart, and she doesn’t know what really happened during the fishing trip: “It was then that he told me what I just told you” (l. 86). It is interesting to point out that the flashback goes into an unusual amount of detail about the man’s actions that night, especially as Stuart seems a man of few words. This could make the readers suspect that Stuart is not telling the truth or that the narrator adds to the story, using her imagination.

Furthermore, because of the narrator’s perspective, readers tend to be suspicious of Stuart as well. How...