★★★★★
January 27th – 30th
I feel like it was really only last year that I discovered that I can actually enjoy literary fiction. Last year, I read Normal People and found that I really liked dipping into those two character’s lives. I felt really similarly about Little Fires Everywhere.
This book has one of the most unique writing styles that I’ve ever read. The main plot of the book follows Mia, an artist who moves and travels constantly with her daughter Pearl. They move into the rental property owned by Mr. and Mrs. Richardson, a wealthy family living in Shaker Heights with their four children. It also follows Bebe, a Chinese woman who abandoned her baby in an act of desperation, and then regretted the decision immediately, and Mr. and Mrs. McCollough who have been trying for a baby for years and are trying to adopt Bebe’s baby.
The way this is written provides so much background to the actions of every single character, explaining why they think the way they do, and why they behave the way they do. I loved the exploration into these characters, and the issues of race, and parenting, relationships between parents and their children that this book had.
The ending to me was also perfect. I loved that this was a slice of these people’s lives, and though it provided some insight into what they would go on to do or think, I enjoyed that everything wasn’t resolved, or fixed, because so often things aren’t.
I’m really excited to get to Celeste Ng’s other book Everything I Never Told You soon.
-Siobhan
Ghost Shark Reads 