Little Fires Everywhere – A Superb Novel on the Depths of Motherhood and Suburban Shallowness

“Sometimes, just when you think everything’s gone, you find a way. Like after a prairie fire. The earth is all scorched and black and everything green is gone. But after the burning the soil is richer, and new things can grow. People are like that too, you know. They start over. They find a way.”

Celeste Ng’s Little Fires Everywhere (published September 2017) literally begins with fire blazing. An elegant house in an opulent suburb is set in flames. The Richardson family, owners and residents of the house, witness the scene with a dazed and detached expression, just as the firemen reports ‘Not an accident’. Who set the fire and Why? There’s not much mystery on ‘who’, because the Richardson couples and their three teenage children are certain that 14-year-old Isabel Richardson aka Izzy, the youngest member of the family, is behind this arson. And, as if to confirm their suspicion, Izzy is conspicuously missing. To know the ‘why’, the story is re-winded back to the months, when a Bohemian mother and her teenage daughter shifted to the affluent, planned community of Shaker Heights, in Cleveland, Ohio. 

Ng’s debut novel Everything I Never Told You (2014) revolves around disappearance and death of teenager Lydia, middle daughter of a Chinese-American family. Ng uses the mystery surrounding Lydia’s suicide or murder to profoundly explore parenthood, suburban life, and racial stereotyping. With her second novel, Ng more gracefully intertwines the tale of two polarizing families to unearth the lurking problems within a seemingly progressive and liberal-minded community. The main focus of Little Fires Everywhere is the mother-children relationship. The fathers are figuratively or literally absent. The mothers in the novel dotes on their girls, determined to give them the best life possible, and in turn build a kind of golden cage, demanding strict adherence to rules and yet they scramble to protect their children from different kinds of maelstrom. On a subtly sociopolitical level, the novel jabs at the grand progressive ideals of mostly-white suburban communities, whom despite their parade of ideals remain blind or unsympathetic to race and class issues.

Little Fires Everywhere is set in the 1990s, dubbed as ‘Post-Racial Era’ in US. Elena Richardson aka Mrs. Richardson is a WASP and her domain is Shaker Heights. She has married her college sweet-heart and settled back in the community, where she grew up. Elena is all about legacy, stability, and rules (‘college, marriage, mortgage, and children’ she says). A husband with a steady job, four beautiful children, big house with flawlessly trimmed lawn, and cars, and what more she could desire for? Elena also believes in doing the ‘right thing’. She proudly claims how Shaker Heights, at the height of Civil Rights Movement, allowed people of other color to inhabit the suburbs. Elena works as a reporter for a local paper, which mostly reports annoyingly positive stories about the neighborhood. Apart from engaging in charity works, Elena also rents out her small apartment house for below market rate; to deserving people who would benefit from her help. She has rented out the lower portion of her apartment to Yang, a genial immigrant from Hong Kong who works as a bus driver. Now the upper portion is rented to Mia Warren, a freewheeling artist, accompanied by her beautiful, spirited 14 year old daughter Pearl Warren.  

Celeste Ng (author photo by Kevin Day Photography)

Mrs. Richardson who subtly controls everybody finds it hard to breakthrough reticent nature of Mia. Mia doesn’t believe in rules or in the strict notions of right and wrong. She has had only one principle so far: To not get attached. The mother-daughter team has for years moved through different American states, always renting out shabby apartments, and only owning things which they could fit into their VW Rabbit. She does part-time work in restaurants and preoccupied with photographic art at other times. Now and then, Mia sells her art through a contact in New York art gallery. The allegedly ‘shabby’ lifestyle and remoteness makes Mrs. Richardson to scrutinize Mia as if she’s an alien being. Elena expects Mia to showcase her ‘gratefulness’ or treat her as ‘noblesse’ (for providing a chance to live in orderly neighborhood). Furthermore, Elena offers Mia to be her house-keeper, thinking she could mold this woman, unlike her own youngest daughter Lexie. By this time, Pearl has very well acquainted with the Richardson family. She spends her evenings in the Richardsons’ couch, sandwiched between Moody, who crushes on Pearl, and Trip, the suave brother of Moody, for whom Pearl holds an infatuation. Pearl also looks up to Lexie, a saucy 17 year old and the eldest of Richardson children. Rebellious Izzy, the youngest of Richardsons', often shuts herself in her room, cooking up ways to upend the irritating orderliness of her life. In order to keep an eye on Pearl, Mia accepts the house-keeping job. But as one could expect, trouble brews. And, the seemingly strong ties between the two families turn murkier.

The subtle power in Celeste Ng’s writing lies in how she conjures certain images to our mind and uses it as a spring-board to broaden the story. For example, the house set ablaze or the painting of a mother looking at her baby in a transfixed manner. The later example plays a key role in finding out the hidden depths of the central character (Mia). Moreover, the painting itself (titled ‘Virgin and Child #1’) – the mother’s utterly absorbed gaze – serves as the symbol for mother-daughter relationship, vividly described in the novel. The child custody battle scenario is brilliantly used to expose the racial and cultural myopia of the white liberals. It holds a mirror up to gaze at the utter superficiality of the liberalism and impenetrable bubble of white liberal privilege. The writer asserts that in communities with nuanced hierarchies and codes, the racism and cultural bias is also expressed through subtle means (privilege and progressive ideals doesn’t mean that one is immune to such things). 

There’s no single, authoritative voice in Little Fires Everywhere. The story which unfurls from the perspective of group of characters provides a holistic view of the happenings.Everyone has their say, and it shows how everyone is limited by their perspective and lack of experience or awareness. The novel is character-driven and its beauty lies in how the author makes us see all the characters’ world from inside out. It’s not a full-fledged mystery or thriller, yet it moves at breakneck pace (I read two-thirds of the novel in a single setting). The most impressive aspect of ‘Little Fires’ is how we forgive or even empathize with certain characters, who might be otherwise pigeonholed as the ‘wicked ones’. Mrs. Richardson comes off as the embodiment of the peculiar Suburb’s virtues and flaws. She desires to suppress passion, uphold rules, deny dark truths, and so on. And, even though Mrs. Richardson’s thoughts and actions incite our fury, we tend to understand her, and even shed a tear or two for her circumscribed thinking. Celeste Ng truly pushes us inside the skin of these people to comprehend their nature. Apart from Mrs. Richardson’s characterization, I also loved how earnestly the author depicts the emotional agonies of the childless McCulloughs. But of course, the large appeal of the novel lies in the way we tend to identify or root for Mia Warren and Izzy Richardson. Since, we the avid readers, often celebrate non-conformity, rule-breaking, and rebellious spirits. I think the splendor of any literary work or art lies in how it kindles the little fires within us, while the ‘normal’, hushed-up life inclines to do the opposite. In that vein, Little Fires Everywhere (352 pages) is a multi-layered and expertly crafted novel, which gracefully extracts our whole emotional energies. There might be little too much spelling out or some heavy, unnecessary foreshadowing, but these are just nitpicks compared to the entrancing reading experience I had. 

 

 

Station Eleven – A Non-Traditional Post-Apocalyptic Fiction on the Endurance of Art and Humanity

“Life, remembered is a series of photographs and disconnected short films”

Canadian novelist Emily St. John Mandel’s fourth novel Station Eleven (published in 2014) is set in a post-apocalyptic world, where 99 percent of human population is wiped out by an unforeseen pandemic disease. The novel won the Arthur C Clarke Award for best science-fiction novel [also one of the year’s National Book Award finalists]. Despite the increasingly familiar post-apocalypse sub-genre and getting pigeon-holed as sci-fi, Station Eleven is much more distinct and understated than the usual survivalist exercise. Emily Mandel herself believes her novel doesn’t belong to any particular genre. Unlike many apocalypse novels, Emily’s narration is deeply introspective, wallowing less on the dystopian horror elements and rather hopefully focuses on the fresh culture that emerges once past the climate of mayhem.   

I initially believed the novel might duplicate few of the broadly imaginative dystopian setting of Stephen King’s The Stand or Robert McCammon’s Swan Song or Justin Cronin’s Passage Trilogy (though there’s a clever reference to this novel). But one-third into the book, I was intrigued by how private the tale is. Emily Mandel weaves a dual narrative -- set before the end of the world and twenty years after –that goes back and forth and follows the beauty of everyday existence through very small pocket of characters. By setting the novel two decades after the societal collapse, the writer smartly brings a ruminative perspective which mostly foregrounds the hopeful and unbreakable relationship between art and humanity.  Emily does hint upon the devastation and violence perpetuated in the lawless world, but mayhem and terror isn’t showcased as the only constant factor in the post-apocalyptic world. It subtly implies how much art could play a vital role in unearthing a fresh civilization and gradually disarm the gathered dark forces.

The novel begins with the death as expected. But the death isn’t the result of dangerous viral strain that will soon wipe out 99% of humanity. An experienced and super-famous Hollywood actor Arthur Leander collapses on the stage while playing King Lear at Toronto’s Elgin Theater. Jeevan Choudhary, an audience member and paramedic-in-training rushes towards Arthur and delivers CPR. But it’s too late. The actor’s heart has given up. However, it would be fascinating to note that Arthur and Shakespeare remain as connecting bridge to all the major characters. Soon after Arthur’s natural death, the spread of a deadly strand of flu (known as ‘Georgian Flu’) brings the entire human civilization to its knees. The story then shifts 20 years after the pandemic to follow ragtag members of Traveling Symphony. Kirstin Raymonde, the once 8 year old child actor who was part of the King Lear performance, is now the narrator of this disparate world. The 28 year old Kirsten and fellow survivors tour small and fairly isolated communities in the Midwest, performing Shakespeare and Orchestra music for the soulful, entertainment-deprived communities.

Author Emily St. John Mandel

The troupe of musicians and actors has faced their due share of violent conflicts over the years and has largely followed the same route without unnecessarily immersing themselves into the dirty local politics. The troupe’s horse-pulled caravan is adorned with a line from Star Trek Voyager: ‘Because survival is inefficient’. By bringing art to the ruined towns, the troupe hopes to showcase the best of humanity (“People want what was best about the world”, one troupe member remarks). We learn that Kirsten obsessively collects clippings and other information about Arthur from old-world magazines, the famous actor who was once kind to little Kirsten. It was Arthur who had gifted Kirsten her beloved graphic novel Station Eleven (about a smart physicist Dr. Eleven living in a huge spaceship after Earth’s surrender to an alien race). The origin of comics takes us back in time and provides us with the novel’s most interesting character Miranda, Arthur’s first wife whose personal afflictions fuels her creative energy. Like Shakespeare, Beethoven, and Star Trek, the graphic novel not simply stands as an alluring symbol of the past, but also emerges as the vital connecting nod between the past and present. The conflicts in the novel kicks-in when the troupe comes across a town that’s taken over by a malevolent ‘Prophet’ and couple of their former members, staying in the town, is pronounced missing. Thankfully, the story-line involving the ‘Prophet’ doesn’t take up familiar route, as writer Emily keeps on jumping back and forth to contemplate on the sweetness of life, before and after the end of the world we built. Despite the fragmented narrative structure, Emily Mandel makes rich thematic connections and bestows profound emotional connection between the characters.

Station Eleven is clearly less about apocalypse and more about memory, fame, yearning, loss and the transcendent beauty of art. The novelist infuses a deeply affecting and thoughtful elegiac tone into a story we otherwise dismiss it as ‘simple-minded page-turner’. Emily Mandel is less interested in making a broad statement on human race’s collective destiny. She rather keeps her narrow yet astoundingly focused vision to reflect on our built-in instinct for artistic expression, in the midst of desperation and catastrophe. What’s more interesting is how the author doesn’t take a discriminative attitude in positioning the different art forms. There’s Shakespeare and Beethoven whose timeless quality we oft cherish as high-art. But then there’s also constant reference to Star Trek and a graphic novel (seen as cheap entertainment). In Emily Mandel’s world, the art culture isn’t fit under strict categories, but simply as different forms of expression within a single existing plane, speaking to individuals in myriad ways.

Station Eleven watches our contemporary world with a sense of wonder and how we take all such advancements for granted. “You walk into a room and flip a switch and the room fills with light……. All of the information in the world is on the Internet, and the 
Internet is all around you, drifting through the air like pollen on a summer breeze”, remarks Kirsten who finds this vision of old-world nearly unbelievable. Few of the survivors holes up at a abandoned airport, its Skymiles Lounge is over the years turned into ‘Museum of Civilization’, where the non-functional gadgets that once drove human’s existence are laid out neatly. In another scenario, a librarian hopes to restart the flow of information through a newspaper and puts together oral history of the new rise of civilization. Emily Mandel conveys the loss in those scenarios through her painful yet lyrical prose that we are nudged to ponder upon the little beauties of life we tend to overlook. Even when conveying the private losses of the characters (for example when Jeevan processes the unanticipated events inside the theater or when Miranda perceives the end of her glitzy Hollywood life) the author’s description rings with deep truth and shines with quiet beauty.  Perhaps the fact that Station Eleven doesn’t have any grand revelations and explosive actions may disappoint readers seeking an elaborate post-apocalyptic fiction. Nevertheless, it’s a superior literary work, which takes a trendy genre setting to get at the fundamental truth of art and human condition.  

The Changeling – A Mesmerizing Fairy Tale on the Horrors of Parenthood and Internet

“There are no secrets anymore. Vampires can’t come into your house unless you invite them. Posting online is like leaving your front door open and telling any creature of the night it can enter.”

Insanity, madness, and horror have always thrived beneath the surface of our normalized societies. But it’s the 21^st century life that’s increasingly making us aware of the hallucinatory or illusory facade concealing the real horror show around us. From childhood, adulthood, marriage, parenting, and old age, we are achingly acknowledging the existential pain, which was somehow hidden by our deep self-delusional notions. While this vividly reveals the entire horrific stuff going inside us and around us, it also makes life infinitely complex and unbelievably rich. We all might be living a tedious routine life, just existing on a purely mechanical level, yet the little revelatory moments gathers around and eventually makes us see not simply the horrific or repulsive things, but also the sense of wonder that drives life. There might be horror and darkness all around us, but I think we must stay optimistic and keep on shining the light of life upon it. Good literature and cinema can really put us on a fast-track to become aware of how things truly are: from addressing the madness of the world to its opulent beauty. But more than ultra-realistic narratives, it is the realm of speculative genre fiction I feel gets to the bottom of this contemporary reality. Sometimes myths and supernatural forces can adequately address the reality of our globalized societies. It’s what Victor Lavalle’s recent novel The Changeling (published June 2017) best does. It’s a dark fairy tale, rooted in ages-old folklore and myth, which actually takes a subtly profound look at racism, fatherhood, paternal anxieties, marriage, and most importantly the dark crevices of internet universe. The book’s veneer of magic plunges us into chaos as well as the grace of life.

Apollo Kagwa, the protagonist of The Changeling, would remind us of Ira Levin’s Rosemary’s Baby and Stephen King’s The Shining; the literary characters whose desperation to be good parent literally set them in a path towards insanity. The novel starts in 1968 New York (“This fairy tale begins in 1968 during a garbage strike” – the novel’s opening line), detailing the courtship between Parole officer Brian West and receptionist Lillian Kagwa, a Ugandan immigrant. They eventually get married in 1976 and Apollo, named after the Sun of God, is born in 1977. But when Apollo was 4 years old, the father West disappears from his life. Apollo suffers from nightmares after his father’s disappearance. One day, a box adorned with the word ‘Improbabilia’ is delivered to the boy. Inside the box, Apollo finds mementos of his parents’ time spent together and a single children’s book, Maurice Sendak’s “Outside Over There”. The box is obviously left by his father. Later the name on the box becomes the name of Apollo’s used-book business.        

In his 30s, Apollo Kagwa falls in love with and marries Emma Valentine, a librarian from Virginia. He seals his bond with her by cutting a red string bracelet she wears around her wrist which she hopes will realize her three wishes. Before cutting the string, Apollo says: “With me, all three of your wishes will come true.” Their yearning to be a parent comes true with the birth of baby Brian West. Apollo fancies himself to be the cool ‘new dad’ who does the dishes, laundry, and takes tons of pictures of his child and posts online for instant likes. While, Apollo wears fatherhood with enthusiasm, Emma seems overly tired and they become estranged from each other. She claims to receive disturbing texts and photos about the boy, but claims it is immediately vanishes before she shows to any one. However, Emma’s two wishes – having a good husband and strong child – were realized. Six months after the birth of baby Brian and before Apollo learns what Emma’s third wish is, the unbelievably horrific thing happens. Apollo’s life would never be the same. The brutal violent act takes Apollo on a journey into the undiscovered and magical corners of New York City.

Author Victor LaValle

 

The Changeling adroitly mixes folklore with the travails of modern existence. Goblins, Rapunzel, the myth of Askeladden play as much an important tale as do the Facebook, mobile apps, etc. LaValle depicts both the mythical monsters as well as the identity-masking trolls inhabiting the realm of social media (I don’t remember reading a fairy tale where the threat of police violence looks imminent). The scenarios often literally unfold in subterranean spaces – subway, basement, caves, tunnels, etc – to constantly keep us on the edge. At its best, LaValle’s prose is as simple, raw and powerful as the works of Haruki Murakami and Neil Gaiman. The early portions of the novel have one of the honest and realistic accounts of the new-age parenthood. LaValle says in an interview: “The people who raised us are often just human beings trying their best. That’s not a young person’s understanding, necessarily. It’s not something I understood when I was young, I was just angry at my father. It wasn’t until I was in my 40s and really thought things through, and had a kid by that point, I could see that all these things I dismissed as complete failures of character, I could see small versions of them in myself, whether it was impatience or the desire to escape.” There’s due reference to Atticus Finch of Lee Harper’s To Kill a Mocking Bird to indicate how boasting the image of benevolent parent is futile and illusory, since parents too are vulnerable individuals like us; they can try but can’t always protect their children from cruelty of the world. In fact, Apollo’s magical journey is about understanding his frailties and culpable behavior as a parent.

“A bad fairy tale has some simple goddamn moral. A good fairy tale tells the truth”, says a character in the novel. LaValle weaves an improbable tale to get to the truth about our contemporary society. Without delving into didactic mode, he likens the social media to the myth of vampires and witches, and emphatically conveys the ultimate emptiness of these technologies. Apollo’s baby photo-sharing obsession is duly perceived as a mixture of selfishness and vanity, not as certified sign of good-parenting. The Changeling ultimately might be a fairy tale that pushes towards ‘happily ever after’ ending, but these profoundly developed characters provide us immense space to understand the prejudices and false assumptions that broods over our society. It asks us to question the old wisdom and conformist standards relentlessly thrown upon us. Riddled with irony, fury, deep compassion, and psychological insights, LaValle’s prose breaks the myths about our post-privacy, post-truth world. Altogether, The Changeling is a poignant novel that flawlessly blends the gritty reality and magical charms. 

Victor LaValle on Changelings, Literary Horror, and Racist Book Reviewers