According to Mitchell and Snyder, “stories compensate for an unknown or unnatural deviance that begs an explanation”. Oyeyemi’s work is, first and foremost, a commentary on racial relations in England and the “otherness” of people of color. By using disability in the capacity of a narrative prosthetic device, the issue of race relations is an undercurrent within the story and certainly the major focus while existing in the background of the story. By linking race and disability, Oyeyemi is exploring what can cause xenophobia and especially in relation to its being passed down through multiple generations. Mitchell and Snyder convey that once “a deviance or marked difference is exposed to the reader and […] brought from the periphery of concerns” that the deviance must be cured or dealt with in some manner. Oyeyemi “cures” the Silver women’s xenophobia, pica, and any mental illness by eliminating Miranda from the story. Miranda is the last Silver woman to be exposed to the blatant xenophobia of 29 Barton Road and she seems to have dismissed not only xenophobia but perhaps to the pica and mental illness that she seems to have inherited from her connection to the Silver bloodline. Stephanou points out that “the house begins to witness the gradual loss of its power” when Miranda “[begins] to invite otherness” by allowing her friend Ore, who is of Nigerian descent, to walk the halls of the home. Perhaps the mere proximity of the xenophobic home, the Silver bloodline, and the Nigerian blood causes the house to sink its proverbial claws a touch deeper into Miranda.
As a way of further questioning the sanity of Miranda, the multiple narratives allow the reader to experience and analyze the various accounts of Miranda’s deterioration and possible death at the hands of 29 Barton Road. I believe that the integrity and ability of our narrators to honestly give their narrator is questionable. We are given multiple reasons to distrust the narrators. This distrust adds another layer of confusion to the sanity of Miranda. It is entirely possible, within the frame of the story, that Miranda is really the sole narrator and that she is suffering from some sort of split within her personality. It is possible, as well, that the story we are presented can be trusted to be accurate and true. The genius of Oyeyemi’s work is that either scenario is entirely plausible and possible. The narration of 29 Barton Road seems to always offer two distinct and opposite scenarios while also casting doubt on the rest of the narrators. The house even advises the reader to discount the entirety of Eliot’s point of view calling him “a terrible liar” while telling the reader “you weren’t there and you don’t know what happened”. This presents a choice of who the reader will ultimately trust as the most reliable narrator which will impact the way that the story is conveyed to the reader. This opens the door for a complete interpretation of mental illness from the reader. I assert that the use of unreliable narrators is an excellent way for Oyeyemi to play with the constructs of the story and to have the text read as a mental illness narrative. If the multiple narrators were removed and the text was read as Miranda being the sole narrator, the implication for mental illness would be astounding. I believe that this could indeed be the case, as Miranda’s illness and failing health seem to be overlooked or lessened by the other characters within the story. We are told by the house, who I believe is a completely unreliable narrator, that Miranda is just achieving perfection by succumbing to the pica and refusing to eat real food. 
