Toni Morrison’s narrative style in Jazz is much like that of William Faulkner.  She uses simple, straightforward language with a very stream of conciseness type of fell to it.  During her novel, she often switches from the narrator speaking, to the person that the action centers on doing the speaking.  This helps to create a feeling that the narrator has truly studied these characters because the novel centers on her watching them.  As the novel does have music imbedded in the most intrinsic parts as to create a boil in the story line.  This boil is a steamy climax of a tenor saxophone solo that has just held out this sultry note that sent chills up the audience’s spines.

        “A colored man floats down out of the sky blowing a saxophone, and below him, a girl talks earnestly to a man in straw hat.  He touches her lip to remove a bit of something there.  Suddenly, she is quiet.  He tilts her chin up.  They stand there.  Her grip on her purse slackens and her neck makes a nice curve” (10).

            The narrative style seems to follow the “Sth” of the high – hat that beats out the rhythm of Joe and Violet’s life (1).  Each of the sentences is placed precisely to make almost a piece of music.  Joe, Violet, Dorcas, and the other characters are the notes in this big city song.  Each of these notes only can create a story all it’s own, but together they create a jazz song full of lust, murder, and love.