Everything I Never Told You

One sentence synopsis... A fresh spin on the familiar dead girl trope that has more in common with a family drama than a mystery thriller. .

Read it if you like... ‘Big Little Lies' or ‘Little Fires Everywhere'. It's part who-dunnit and part emotional (if somewhat heavy handed) character study. .

Dream casting... It's probably no surprise given the books it reminds me of but I thought Reese Witherspoon would be all over this. Turns out Julia Roberts already beat her to it and has been attached to the film adaption since 2018.

Everything about this book is tragic – the main event, all of the relationships, all the things they never tell each other. Yet the story is so compelling. I was gripped, wanting to intervene and clear up misunderstandings between the characters and tell them all what they aren't seeing. It's such a strange feeling to enjoy a book so much that made me so sad.

I hate all of the characters in this book (except for Hannah). They are all so selfish yet they seem to think they are doing others a favor.
But the prose are quite beautiful so I gave 3 stars.

“Lydia is dead.”, these three words mark the beginning of Lydia's journey which we're about to embark upon. These three words make you think it cannot possibly get worse. Right until it gets worse. A lot worse.I can relate to this book on so many levels: First and foremost, I'm a father. I'm not prone to nightmares but there's one that has haunted me countless times since my first child was born - losing a child. Fortunately, the nightmare didn't become reality and I hope it stays that way.This is what this book is (partly) about, though: Losing a child. The reasons, the family, the friends (or lack of); everything is believable and feels shockingly truthful. Painfully so, even.Secondly, as the husband of a woman who made being independent a prerequisite for her moving in with me. A woman who spent the next 20 years lovingly caring for our children, as wise as Solomon, as strong as Hercules, as clever as Gandalf. A woman who then decided - quite unlike Marilyn - there was even more she wanted to do and moved on to get an apprenticeship in a field she loves and where she can apply her skills and learn new ones. She will have finished this apprenticeship before our own children finish theirs.As we know, Lydia, 16, is dead. She was the daughter of Marilyn and James Lee and had two siblings - her older brother Nathan (“Nath”) and Hannah, her younger sister. “Everything I Never Told you” explores their pasts, their present and, in tiny glimpses, their futures. At the beginning, we find ourselves in 1977 but we're going to take a ride through the decades that will likely forever be “before Lydia” to the family right to the point where past and present tragically converge.Unobtrusively and narrated with empathy and understanding, it tries to answer the one question every parent would ask: Why?James is the son of Chinese immigrants. Born in the USA, he is American as he never ceases to tell himself. He knows he looks different compared to his caucasian compatriots and then as, unfortunately, today, this does matter. Thus, James always wants to blend in, tries not to stand out but to do what he feels he has to do. Like being the sole provider for his family and, without wanting to, destroying his wife's dreams.He never quite manages to overcome his inhibitions due to him being different, though, and he projects his own wishes on his children.Because Marilyn wanted to be a doctor. She excelled in her classes, she studied hard in pursuit of her life's dream. All the while harassed by her own mother to instead meet a “nice Harvard man”, marry him and be a good wife and mother.Life happened, though, and instead of a doctor Marilyn became James' wife and later on she came to the false conclusion “It was a sign, Marilyn decided. For her it was too late.”Years later, she tries to start anew but fails to achieve her goals once more. She, too, just like James, reacts by putting pressure on her daughter Lydia to achieve Marilyn's dreams. Lydia doesn't have a childhood but a series of learning events, “extra credit assignments”, competitions. She doesn't get to be bad at something or she's met with even more “incentives” to work harder. Feeling deeply indebted to her mother, Lydia complies. She doesn't quite know why because she doesn't really want to do all this.Nathan on the other hand knows exactly what he wants:“That fall, when the guidance counselor had asked Nath about his career plans, he had whispered, as if telling her a dirty secret. “Space,” he'd said. “Outer space.” Mrs. Hendrich had clicked her pen twice, in-out, and he thought she was going to laugh. [...] Instead Mrs. Hendrich told him there were two routes: become a pilot or become a scientist.”Nathan wants to go to space and - similarly to his father - he does what he has to do. He tirelessly works towards his goal all the while understanding the tearing his parents do to Lydia:“Do what everyone else is doing. That's all you ever said to Lydia. Make friends. Fit in.”, Marilyn tells James and goes on to state that she “didn't want her to be just like everyone else.” The rims of her eyes ignite. “I wanted her to be exceptional.””.Nathan is Lydia's cornerstone and anchor; the one person who truly understands her and who tries to alleviate her situation. When he, too, seemingly deserts her, Lydia feels put on a path that can only lead to one conclusion...And, yet, whereas we, the readers, know what is to come from those first three words, Lydia herself finds a way to deal with all the pushing and pulling in opposite directions by her parents:“If she fails physics, if she never becomes a doctor, it will be all right. She will tell her mother that. And she will tell her mother, too: it's not too late. For anything. She will give her father back his necklace and his book. She will stop holding the silent phone to her ear; she will stop pretending to be someone she is not.”Last but not least there's Hannah, the youngest daughter and the one mostly overlooked by her parents. Even though she may not be able to express her fears and thoughts, she's often spot-on with her observations and is very sensitive to the mood in her family. Whenever she gets any attention from her parents, she grows, only to wilt soon after in Lydia's shadow.Ultimately, “Everything I Never Told You” is about what all characters never told each other. It is about open and latent xenophobia in our society. It is about parents trying to model their children according to their, the parents, wishes instead of the children's. Celeste Ng spins all this elegantly and seemingly effortlessly into a force of a nature of a novel that blew me away, reduced me to rubble and helped rebuild myself.Ng's writing is beautiful and evocative:“[Her hair] darkened from golden-wheat to amber. It kinked and curled like a fiddlehead fern. It amazed him that he could have such an effect on anyone. As she dozed in his arms, her hair slowly relaxed, and when she woke, it had stretched back to its usual waves.”If it hadn't been for the ending as it is, this book would already have been a solid four-star read. With the terrible and crushing conclusion that still allows for hope and redemption, though, “Everything I Never Told You” becomes an instant classic that everyone but especially parents should read - right after telling their children the one simple truth that can literally and metaphorically save lives:“I love you. You're perfect just as you are.” Blog Facebook Twitter Instagram

I can't remember the last time I didn't finish a book before this one. Everyone is unhappy. Everything sucks. Unfulfilled lives... Also, I'm tired of reading books where pregnancy is a thing that happens to women, rather than being their choice.

Oikein tyylikäs ja hillityn hallittu kertomus perheestä, jossa kaikki pitävät yllä kulisseja, kunnes rakastetun tyttären kuolema pistää kaiken kerralla säpäleiksi.

1970-luvun ohiolaisessa pikkukaupungissa kiinalaisamerikkalainen Leen perhe erottuu joukosta, isä James ja lapset Nathan, Lydia ja Hannah ovat kaupungin ainoat aasialaiset. James haluaa enemmän kuin mitään muuta kuulua joukkoon, olla suosittu ja erottumatta muista. Äiti Marilyn taas olisi itse halunnut saavuttaa elämässään enemmän ja kun se ei onnistunut, haluaisi tyttärensä saavuttavan.

Näiden paineiden keskelle rakentuu hieno jännitteiden verkosto, joka purkautuessaan rikkoo asioita ja jättää jälkeensä perheen, jonka on koottava itsensä uudestaan.

Celeste Ng is gifted at creating gripping family dramas. I read Little Fires Everywhere first and absolutely loved it. Everything I Never Told You started a bit slow for me, but for second 2/3 of the book I was fully invested in the characters and their story. The Lee family is thrown off balance when 16 year old Lydia Lee is found dead in the lake near their home. Lydia was the perfect daughter, adored by both of her parents. However, it becomes clear that her family did not really understand her. Her death forces the remaining family members to evaluate their relationships and to reconsider their supposed happiness.

Ng's greatest skill is in her character development. Her characters are complex and dynamic; they stick with you after reading. The way she reveals their thoughts and feelings allows the reader to develop empathy for the characters. Her characters seem so real. The issues they struggle with are universal. In this book in particular, the characters deal with issues of identity, loneliness, sexuality, fidelity, gender roles, and more. Ng weaves these topics together so well that it never seems like too much.

I especially enjoyed the character of Hannah in this book. Hannah is the third and final child, and she is often forgotten. She is not the firstborn son or the perfect daughter. She lives in the shadow of her siblings. I was often frustrated by how her family ignored her. Their lack of attention, though, allowed her to be the most observant of the family members. She understood the other people in a way that the other characters couldn't because she watched everything closely. No one noticed her observing them. She ends up being a binding force for her family in the end.

If you enjoy a stories about families and their struggles with difficulties of life, you will like this book. I am rating it 4.5 stars. The only reason it is not a 5 star read for me is that I struggled with the pacing in the beginning. Other than that, this is great book.

I just want to adopt nath

This review can also be found on my blog.

I wasn't sure what to expect going into this, but I found myself hooked within the first fifty pages. This is the quietly beautiful examination of a family as they struggle with the loss of one of their children. The middle child of an interracial couple, Lydia is the dream girl, everything her parents couldn't be. Losing her finally upsets a balance that had no business continuing as long as it did, and the family must come to terms with what they'll discover, or risk losing everything.

At its core, this is really the story of secrets gone wrong. There are so many tipping points at which, had the characters chosen to act differently, a divergent outcome could have been triggered. James, the father, has rejected his background as the child of Chinese immigrants, wanting nothing more than to fit in. Marilyn, the mother, regrets allowing motherhood to overtake her dreams of medical school. Nath, the oldest son, feels unloved and forgotten. Lydia is pressured by both her parents to fit in and to succeed where they could not. Hannah, the youngest daughter, watches quietly from the background and notices what the others are too preoccupied to notice.

There is so much that is deeply explored here, and it is difficult to point fingers and place blame. One must come to terms with the fact that everyone in this book has made mistakes, and that their silence has come at a cost. Each of the characters is deeply sympathetic in their own ways and all of their stories are equally important. Don't come into this book expecting an exciting thriller, because the who of Lydia's death is less important than the why, and what will happen afterward.

I've rarely read anything that covered such personal topics that was as superficial and hollow as this novel. The only character who is even remotely believable as a real human being is the younger daughter, Hannah. Everyone else–from the robotic father James to the dissatisfied mother Marilyn, from the dead daughter Lydia to the invisible son Nath–is a cardboard cut out of a TV-movie cliche person. The book has no depth, no felt emotion, no events that even feel anything other than contrived for the purposes of making the reader feel this is a moving story. It isn't. It's a mish-mosh of adolescent angst, feminist frustration and second hand resentment of bigotry towards Chinese people in the US. The author was born three years after the latest event in the story, so everything about it is second hand, and feels it. I have her second novel, but I will not read it. This was a huge disappointment.

“Lydia is dead. But they don't know this yet. 1977, May 3, six thirty in the morning, no one knows anything but this innocuous fact: Lydia is late for breakfast.”

Following the lives of the Lee family before and after the death of middle-child Lydia, Everything I Never Told You is a story of family expectations, of the judgmental gaze of society, of a family doomed by circumstance. It is the story of Lydia, favored by both her mother and father, who saw in her the lives they wanted for themselves. It's the story of Nath, her older brother who helped her shoulder the burden of favoritism, while he resented this neglect. It's the story of Hannah, forgotten youngest child who saw and understood more than anyone could know. It's the story of the stories that made up the lives of Marilyn and James before and after they got married, and became parents to these children who bear the brunt of their love and their decisions.

This is not normally the type of book I go for, but several glowing reviews convinced me I should read it, and I'm glad I did. At times I felt the characters and their wants were a little contrived, a little one-note, but the writing was evocative and beautiful enough that I can overlook that, especially since it works so well in the context of the plot. And I grew to love the characters regardless, so maybe they weren't so one-note after all. I especially adored Hannah, and wanted to give her so many hugs throughout the entire story:

“Hannah, as if she understood her place in the cosmos, grew from quiet infant to watchful child: a child fond of nooks and corners, who curled up in closets, behind sofas, under dangling tablecloths, staying out of sight as well as out of mind, to ensure the terrain of the family did not change.”

She was truly great. I also grew to love Jack, and wanted to give him all the hugs as well.

This book is short and keeps you turning the pages, despite no real overarching mystery element: you know Lydia is dead, and you are fairly certain as to the how, and even the why is fairly obvious from early on, but unspooling the thread of everything the family thought they knew about one another kept me gripped. 4/5

I loved this book. Very well written. Character driven. Held my attention from the beginning.

Hauntingly beautiful story.

This is my first Celeste Ng and I am not disappointed!

Our story follows a Chinese American family in the 1970s who are living a seemingly normal life until their eldest daughter drowns in the local lake (not a spoiler, it's on the back of the book!). We then follow them in two timelines - one after this event trying to come to terms with their loss and figure out what happened and one in the past before this happened.

I really liked the writing and the character building in this book, both are strong points and make the book compelling to read. I also admire the way Ng threaded in underlying plots when such a moving and powerful main story was the focus of the novel.

My only real criticism is that there were sometimes some larger sections between dialogue which meandered slightly, so that I found myself having to go back and reread sections to get the point. It wasn't too distracting however I did feel that it made a 290 page book feel longer.

What a beautiful, sad story. All the characters are so well done.

This was a slow burn read for me. After reading the first few chapters I wasn't sure whether I was going to love it as much as everyone else had seemed to. However as I got immersed in the story, I became really impressed by how Celeste Ng wrote atmosphere and loneliness into this story. I found the struggle of identity for all the siblings fascinating. I loved the bits from James perspective on race and his anxieties for his mixed race children. James and Marilyn's overbearing expectations of Lydia and their neglect of their other two children was super interesting to me also. I also loved the development of Jack's character within the book. I found the why done it element over the who done it, so gripping within this book. While I had doubts about Hannah's perceptiveness of all the other characters. By the end I was fully invested in the story. I loved that you were given the time to understand and connect with all the characters and were exposed to their faults and inner motives during the time scale of the novel. A novel I would recommend to fans of thriller novels but also for readers who are looking for a contemporary read that deals with relevant topics of race and family dynamics. A high 4 star read for me.

I have to agree with everyone else. This wasn't a thriller it was just about extremely unlikable characters.

I really also don't like reading about parents who screw up their children's childhood because of their own unresolved personal issues. Always cringe-worthy.

Spectacular from start to finish; the language is incredible, the author guides the story so deftly it feels organic, and the events in the book are all the more wrenching because you come to understand and empathize with each of the characters.

A decent book that was easy to listen to. It's the story of a family, that is revealed in flashbacks after the oldest daughter ends up dead at the bottom of a lake. It's a cautionary tale for those parents who have too high ambitions for their children and those who think they know their children. It's the story of a family of introverts and outcasts who have a hard time fitting into their environment, but who also suffer from a lack of understanding and communication inside their home. All of them seem to be quietly suffering.

I can't give it more than 3 stars, because even though I quite enjoyed it, I never really started caring for the characters. It's like I looked at their lives through a filter. Even if the characters experienced raw outbursts of emotions, it felt subdued by the language.

Early on, we see Lydia's room through her mother's eyes, and it's easy to think there are clues to Lydia's identity in what her mother observes. But, in a sense, everything in Lydia's room is an illusion filtered through the eyes of someone who fundamentally doesn't know her child. Only when the mother – Marilyn – looks closer does she really begin to see that the room is more Potemkin Village than anything else, signified by a row of empty diaries.

No one expresses their deepest fears and disappointments:

“If I'm not perfect, my parents might go away.”

“I've always felt different from everyone else, and so I can only love the things about my children that differ from me.”

“My life got sidetracked when I ended up following my mother's blueprint for my life, and so I must press my daughter to achieve her dreams, which are strangely the same as the ones I had for myself.”

“Why is the spotlight always on Lydia?”

The youngest child spends the whole novel observing and being able to do so because no one really interacts with her. She longs to reach out, to touch, to hug, but her family keeps moving out of her reach, either oblivious to her needs or irritated by them. She is hopefully destined to put her observational skills and empathy to good use.

It's under these conditions of lack of emotional honesty that tragedy happens.

The ending has a surprising amount of hope in it, which I'm not sure I buy, but because I've spent time with these people would hope is possible.

Quis ler por tanto tempo, mas fiquei com gosto de “fala mais”. Sobre a própria Lydia, sobre a mãe da Marilyn, sobre a Hannah, sobre o Jack. Havia muitos personagens e muito pouco sobre eles, tive a sensação.

A good book, for me, is both revelatory and redemptive. This book is both.

It's quite awful, horrifying, really, in the same way that We Need to Talk About Kevin was awful and horrifying to me as a parent. We want to think that we are trying our best as parents. We want to think that we aren't going to make those terrible mistakes our own parents made with us. And we don't; we simply make different ones.

A very powerful book.

Overall feeling..... Glad I read this book but it is a sad book. It focuses on the miscommunication that happens in a family. Hopes and dreams for themselves and other family members cause pain.
The book does make you think about how you shape others by your desires for them.

Barely managed to hold back the tears at the last fifteen pages. Stunning.

This book is like a steam train. It starts off very slowly, but as it gains momentum, it is very difficult to stop. An intriguing and powerful examination into discrimination and parental expectations.