Literary and Criticism 

Celeste Ng's Little Fires Everywhere is a novel that explores themes of race, class, and identity, and motherhood. Through the lives of two differing families in the suburban community of Shaker Heights, Ohio. Ng specifically uses Shaker Heights to show how people think they’re open-minded but fail to realize their own bias and privileges based on class level. A major theme that grows throughout the novel is privilege and expectations held by the society. The Richardson family represents stability and order. They are the type of family to use their social class against others, they tend to assume their decisions are correct since they have wealth and a high social class. On the other hand, Mia Warren and her daughter Pearl live an unpredictable, hectic life. They thrive off of creativity and sporadic, impulsive decisions. This reflects how privilege influences the character's decisions and how they react to others. Another central theme of the novel is race and identity. The custody battle over May Ling reveals the difficulties of balancing your culture while also staying true with your intentions. Characters like Mrs. Richardson believes raising May Ling in a privileged, white household is better than raising her around her cultural roots. Once again this shows how your social class can alter situations. Overall, Little Fires Everywhere allows readers to see multiple perspectives and deepen their understanding of how people struggle with identity, belonging, and sticking to their true intention. 

Celeste Ng’s Everything I Never Told You is a strong novel full of family dynamics, identity, and the effects of silence. The story begins with the death of a girl, Lydia Lee. She is the middle child of a Chinese-American family. Ng automatically shows family dynamics after her first line, “Lydia is dead”. A central theme throughout the novel is miscommunication and unknown expectations. The title represents a million secrets kept throughout the book. Each member of the family creates invisible barriers that ties up their hopes and fears. Lydia has constant expectations from her family that make her overwhelmed. Her mother wants her to become a doctor while her father wants her to fit into the society that already labeled him as different. As a result of this pressure Lydia isolates herself from her family since she feels unable to express her own wants. Another theme of this novel, which seems to be recurring, is race and belonging. Lydia's family feels pressure to fit in which shapes their relationships. Lydia struggles to balance her parents expectations while also completing her own expectations for herself. Ng’s use of narrative structure and secrets deepen the emotional state of the novel. Moving back and fourth between time reveals the characters regret, hidden truths, and secrets from throughout the novel. This structure shows how the unspoken truths can shape lives and also can do more worse than good.