EVERYTHING I NEVER TOLD YOU

“Everything I Never Told You”  by  Celeste Ng was moving, beautiful, heart-breaking, and at times unbelievable, but yes, what you see with the Lee family, really does happen and their stories need to be told.

Celeste Ng is a masterful writer. Her words paint pictures of real people suffering from interesting problems that many readers will relate to. I was drawn into the lives of the five members of this family as if they were my own relatives. The best part of the book is the exquisite writing. The word pictures are stunning and revealing of the character of the people whose lives unfold in this wonderful novel.

The book starts off with the family’s daughter, Lydia, is declared dead (this is from the first sentence, so don’t worry, no spoiler) and her family deals with her death in different ways. Each of her family suffers some kind of identity crisis. Through flashbacks and multiple perspectives, each characters, reveal their motivations and the scars perpetrated on each of them as a result of feeling like outsiders in a world that doesn't accept biracial marriages. What Celeste Ng does so well is make the characters' revelations unfold like a mystery leading to wonder if Lydia was murdered, committed suicide, or had an accident.

This is a great read. There was a feeling of anticipation of what is felt to be good experience and will hold its readers captive from the first to last sentence.