Michael
I loved Celeste Ng’s Little Fires Everywhere.
The Richardson family lives in Shaker Heights, Ohio. The family is made up or Mr. and Mrs. Richardson and their four children: Lexie, Trip, Moody, and Izzy. They are comfortably upper middle class and live in comfortably upper middle-class Shaker Heights, Ohio, just outside Cleveland. Elena Richardson inherited a small duplex from her parents and rents it out. She rents it to Mia, a single mother and her daughter Pearl.
The novel begins with the Ricardson’s house burning down. We go back in time to find out why.
Ng gives us characters that are good but do questionable things at times. She shows us that while we think things are black and white, they are really shades of gray. Sometimes when faced with choices you must pick the least bad thing. Sometimes when you are faced with two good choices, you must pick the choice that is the most good, and hopefully the person choosing is aware that this choice is sure to hurt someone who doesn’t deserve to be hurt.
Although I know that there are some who see this differently, I felt that there were no bad characters. There were decent people who made bad choices, or perhaps we should say, they made unthinking choices in the heat of the moment.
The novel covers the important themes of cultural identity, motherhood, economic privilege, and white privilege.
Ng shows that there are rules we live by, but she asks, should we? If we choose not to live by these rules, she asks, who do we hurt.
I liked and could identify with most of the characters, but I didn’t like Izzy very much. Perhaps it is my age. I thought Mia was also a little hard to take at the beginning. No one could be that wise, that caring, and that talented. But as we go along, we learn that Mia too has made a terrible choice for the most understandable of reasons.
I was debating between a 4.75 and 5 and then realized I would remember and think about this novel for a long time, so 5 it is.
I loved Celeste Ng’s Little Fires Everywhere.
The Richardson family lives in Shaker Heights, Ohio. The family is made up or Mr. and Mrs. Richardson and their four children: Lexie, Trip, Moody, and Izzy. They are comfortably upper middle class and live in comfortably upper middle-class Shaker Heights, Ohio, just outside Cleveland. Elena Richardson inherited a small duplex from her parents and rents it out. She rents it to Mia, a single mother and her daughter Pearl.
The novel begins with the Ricardson’s house burning down. We go back in time to find out why.
Ng gives us characters that are good but do questionable things at times. She shows us that while we think things are black and white, they are really shades of gray. Sometimes when faced with choices you must pick the least bad thing. Sometimes when you are faced with two good choices, you must pick the choice that is the most good, and hopefully the person choosing is aware that this choice is sure to hurt someone who doesn’t deserve to be hurt.
Although I know that there are some who see this differently, I felt that there were no bad characters. There were decent people who made bad choices, or perhaps we should say, they made unthinking choices in the heat of the moment.
The novel covers the important themes of cultural identity, motherhood, economic privilege, and white privilege.
Ng shows that there are rules we live by, but she asks, should we? If we choose not to live by these rules, she asks, who do we hurt.
I liked and could identify with most of the characters, but I didn’t like Izzy very much. Perhaps it is my age. I thought Mia was also a little hard to take at the beginning. No one could be that wise, that caring, and that talented. But as we go along, we learn that Mia too has made a terrible choice for the most understandable of reasons.
I was debating between a 4.75 and 5 and then realized I would remember and think about this novel for a long time, so 5 it is.