Little Fires Everywhere, by Celeste Ng
Summary
Almost completely altruistic in her behaviour towards others (with her daughter Pearl a notable exception), Mia is the linchpin upon which the entire novel rests – and it works tremendously well. “It turned out that despite their best intentions, her parents had prepared her exceptionally well for art school.” Pearl herself is – as one might imagine – not exactly the typical teenager albeit her school life is difficult at times, boys become a very distinct interest, well, and lots of other common issues. Just Pearl is special… Lexie has it all figured out: Having known her boyfriend Brian for years, dating him for two, having “done the deed” with him recently, she already pictures her studies at Yale which accepted her, her triumphant return to her hometown as well as subsequent marriage, kids and a sheltered life in suburbia. Technically, there are the McCulloughs, Bebe Chow, a Chinese immigrant, their/her daughter May Ling-Mirabelle and others but while they’re all interesting to read about, they have to take a back seat because the main cast needs all the room in this fine-spun, brilliantly-told narrative about freedom, loss and redemption. Or, to stay within the main motif of the book… ““Rules existed for a reason: if you followed them, you would succeed; if you didn’t, you might burn the world to the ground.”” … and, yes, that may be true but as Mia puts it so fittingly… “Sometimes you need to scorch everything to the ground, and start over.
