Celeste Ng’s “Little Fires Everywhere” and they have turned out to me two good books to read together.
The full title of BE’s nonfiction book is “Natural Causes: An Epidemic of Wellness, the Certainty of Dying, and Killing Ourselves to Live Longer” and the title tells you pretty much what the book is about. I don’t agree with everything she says but her writing is always interesting and a good read for me. She’s one of my favorite journalist/activist/social critics. Most people probably know her best from her “Nickled and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America in which she tried to live on minimum wage jobs. This one is about the things we’re willing to do to try to live as long as possible. As always, economic class comes into play in this book.
Which brings me to Celeste Ng’s novel, Little Fires Everwhere” about an affluent family in Shaker Heights, OH who rents a small house to a single mother/artist and her teen daughter who are just barely getting by financially. I’m only about a quarter of the way in but I really like it. I got hooked in from page one.
