The book discusses Gallant's disconcerting use of techniques and their impact on her work's thematics, reconciling the inherent tension governing the lives of Gallant's characters and the way she strains language while exploiting narrative devices to translate it. Each chapter of the book handles one technique in depth, giving readers tools to study the same techniques in other works by Gallant. The variety of techniques discussed both highlights Gallant's skillfulness and clarifies her work, both on a thematic and technical level.