Who is the narrator, can she or he read minds, and, more importantly, can we trust her or him?
Third-Person (Omniscient)
Patchett is using third-person omniscient viewpoint to tell her tale, and dang, it's impressive. She uses this technique to move seamlessly from moment to moment, character to character, often in a complex pattern that leaves ordinary chronological structuring far behind.
For what she's doing here, this works fantastically well, because it lets her show us different people's backstories and interior monologues. That's really important in a book like Bel Canto because it's ultimately about a whole community, and this narrative style lets us identify with and understand a wide range of characters.