What is the narrator point of view in the novel, When the English Fall?

David Williams uses a first person point of view for the entirety of the novel. The first page is a letter with a U.S. Army War College letterhead, and features an official note from Colonel Terrence E. Marker to Dr. Jeanine Ernestine. The letter is made up of two parts: the first is the official letter, written in an impersonal direct address style. It gives the impression that this piece of communication is following a template, or a set of strict rules. The second part of the letter is an attached note. This note is written in a much more colloquial style, and is a first person direct address to Jeanine, from Terry. Terry is sending Jeanine a set of journals he discovered in an old farmhouse in Pennsylvania, which she wants for her studies as a sociology professor. This letter is the only part of the novel that involved either Terrence Marker or Jeanine Ernestine, and so is the only piece of information from their time period, and Colonel Marker's point of view. It establishes that these two people exist in a time after the events of the journals. The reader thus knows to treat the contents of the journals like they are something from the past of the world in which the novel takes place.

The rest of the novel is narrated in a close first person, by Jacob. Jacob's journals contain descriptions of people and events that are, of course, only from his point of view, and so it is important for the reader to remember that, like any primary source document, Jacob's journal contains biases. These biases inform the way he views the world, and the way he relates it on paper. Jacob is not an unreliable narrator, because he seems to give fair and objective accounts of what happens around him. If anything, he is too fair a narrator. He is forgiving and empathetic where other people would be angry and hysterical. This may make him an ideal narrator for the chaotic events of the apocalypse, because he is able to give thorough, even-keeled descriptions of horrific events. He does not dip into apathy or melodrama at any point. This may also make him a poor narrator, however, because his point of view may not deal with the emotions and instinctual reactions that most other people would have.