Little Fires Everywhere, a 2017 novel by Celeste Ng, follows the story of two families living in a seemingly perfect suburban neighborhood in Shaker Heights, Ohio. The novel aims to explore the thin line between right and wrong, and “the danger of believing that following rules can avert disaster.”

   Additionally, the story also attempts a commentary on issues that permeate modern politics, such as abortion and race relations. Essentially what happened is that a young Chinese immigrant had to abandon her baby (safely, wrapped in blankets, right outside a fire station), because she had no means to support herself, let alone a child. A white family adopted the baby, but when the child’s biological mother had gotten back on her feet, she fought for custody of her baby. There was a lot of controversy surrounding the case, with many believing a white family would not be able to properly raise a Chinese daughter. Whatever message Ng hoped to portray here, however, was quite convoluted. She did not go in-depth enough into the situations she presented in the story to offer a real conclusion. This would not necessarily be a bad thing if the writing had been a little better, because it allows the readers to choose a side for themselves. The problem lies in the way that Ng stacked up evidence against the side she did not agree with and allowed no room for audience interpretation.

   Regarding the general plot, as the custody case was only a subplot, there are too many things that happened to properly summarize it.  So, as basically as I can put it, the story follows the Richardson family, a wealthy family home in the Shaker Heights neighborhood. Mrs. Richardson rents out one of her properties to the Warren family, a mother named Mia and her daughter Pearl. These two families’ drama permeates the other, and they become so intertwined that Mrs. Richardson dedicates herself to uncovering the secret of Mia’s past.

   The premise of the plot is not all that interesting. It is an overplayed story about a neighborhood that looks perfect on the outside but is not what it seems. It can be really cliché at times, especially since the majority of the plot revolves around discovering a character’s secrets.

   Similarly, the characters are also pretty stereotypical and two-dimensional; just among the Richardson kids, there are the popular kids and the outcasts. The only real dynamic character is Mia, which makes it obvious that Ng intended for her to be the “good guy.” This also makes it clear what side Ng takes in the custody case subplot, considering the reason the Chinese mother found out where her baby was, was because of Mia.

   Ng allows Mia to make mistakes, as all characters do, but she portrays Mia’s growth as well, and her good deeds. This type of treatment is lacking in other characters, especially Mrs. Richardson, as she is made out to be an antagonizing force to basically everyone another character; Mrs. Richardson “hates” one of her daughters, is constantly out to get Mia, argues wit

h her husband about the custody case attempts to sabotage the Chinese mother and hides secrets from her children.

   One of the more obvious messages of Little Fires Everywhere is about love and motherhood; is being a mother about being blood-related, or is it just about loving a child, even if you did not give birth to them? This is a really interesting and thought-provoking question, and Ng does a good job at setting up the stage for the audience to really ponder it. The thing that I did not like is that who the audience roots for is definitely influenced by Ng’s writing choices; as mentioned earlier, she stacks the deck against one side of the disagreement.

   Despite these writing choices, the entire plot about the custody battle was written well enough to make me angry (in a good way). I quickly picked a side and find out the resolution of the issue kept me reading for hours. However, my decision in who is right and who is wrong could have easily been influenced by Ng’s writing choices in making Mia always be on the right side of things

   All in all, I did not like how the story was set up; the novel opens with the Richardson family watching their house burn down. The story goes on to explain everything leading up to that point, and the fire is not spoken about until the last few pages. I saw a video explaining why the movie ‘Tangled’ would be better without its first five minutes because it would be much more of a plot twist to find out that Mother Gothel is not actually Rapunzel’s mother. The same applies here; a Richardson burning their house down would have been a much more powerful consequence of their arrogance and ignorance had the readers not already known about it.

   This book receives a seven out of ten for me. It was interesting enough to read, but became pretty convoluted when it comes to the plot and message.