David Mitchell's Half-Lives: The First Luisa Rey Mystery

David Mitchell’s Cloud Atlas provides a thriller mystery in the form of third person in ‘Half-Lives: The First Luisa Rey Mystery.’ In contrast to his first two stories ‘The Pacific Journal of Adam Ewing’ and ‘Letters From Zedelghem’ which both use first person as in to talk directly to its reader. By using third person, Mitchell can illustrates all the characters thoughts and movements in one, in which first person only gives you the option of hearing the thoughts of the main character. This engages the readers and helps them understand all the characters. A quote that demonstrates this is, “Luisa Rey hears a clunk from the neighboring balcony. ‘Hello?’ Nobody. Her stomach warns her to set down her tonic water,” (pg. 90). As this quote clarifies,