Why people recommend it
Everything I never told you by Celeste Ng is a character-driven debut novel that explores family dynamics, racial identity, and expectations within a mixed-race family in 1970s Ohio following the mysterious death of a daughter. On The Book Review podcast, Greg Coles mentioned reading the novel as a smaller, less intimidating project. Host Pamela Paul and host Gilbert Cruz both spoke with the author about the structural choices in her debut, noting how the narrative begins with a dead tragedy and works to reconstruct the family history. Celeste Ng reflected on why the 1970s served as an ideal backdrop for the complex emotional struggles her characters faced. Cruz also highlighted the unprecedented commercial success of the release, noting that it became a massive bestseller and was named a top book of the year by major retailers.
Who recommended it
- Celeste Ng Discussed
- Gilbert Cruz Discussed
- Pamela Paul Discussed
- Greg Coles Recommended
Celeste Ng — 2 mentions
“well the first book uh everything I never told you the 70s seem like a time that really sort of highlighted all of the things that I realized that this family was wrestling with”
“well the first book uh everything I never told you the 70s seemed like a time that really sort of highlighted all of the things that I realized that this family was wrestling with”
Gilbert Cruz — 2 mentions
“so it's interesting because your first book everything I never told you your debut began with a dead girl and you were sort of trying to figure out reconstruct what happened this new novel begins with a fire”
“your first novel everything I never told you you had an amazing highly unusual experience for a debut author in that it became a mega bestseller I think Amazon for the first time named it the best book of the year”
Pamela Paul — 1 mention
“it's interesting because your first book everything I never told you your debut began with a dead girl”
Greg Coles — 1 mention
“and so in the meantime I'm Tiding myself over with a a much smaller and uh and less intimidating book um it's a a novel that came out a couple years ago called Everything I Never Told You by Celeste in”
Also mentioned in the same episodes
Other mentions (3: passing, ad reads, own books)
“your first book everything I never told you”
“and I imagine that Celeste may also not only as a reader have felt Maxine Hong Kingston's influence but also as a novelist herself in her two books little fires everywhere and everything I Never Told You”
“um and everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ang who was mentioned several times”