“Little Fires Everywhere” explores issues of race and class amplified by a custody battle over the adoption of a Chinese-American baby.

“Our Missing Hearts” follows Ng’s novel “Little Fires Everywhere,” set in her hometown of Shaker Heights and adapted for TV audiences as a Hulu series starring Reese Witherspoon and Kerry Washington. And a lot of times that's the beginning of change.” “But when you see a piece of art and it actually touches you, a lot of times it gives you a feeling that you have to sit and process. “It can kind of sidestep the rational part of our brain that might ignore statistics and might ignore an op-ed or an article about what's going on,” Ng said. When asked about how art can change minds, Ng said one big thing is how art affects people emotionally. While art is a not a “silver bullet for a lot of the big problems we face,” it can offer a “window towards the future,” Ng said.

Physically apart from his mother, for instance, Bird recalls the stories she’d tell him as a boy. “Building that kind of empathy, I think, gives us the motivation to tackle some of these huge issues.”Īrt and its hopefulness are also woven throughout as Ng explores both creative expression as protest and the comfort found in beloved fairy tales.

“When we bring these problems down to the personal level … I think it's a lot harder to look away,” Ng said. While the world these characters live in is fictionalized, the problems are familiar. Throughout the novel, Ng illuminates current racial issues, such as treating people differently due to race and, in more serious instances, violently attacking people. Government laws snuff out the mere suggestion of dissent, especially from people of Asian origin, including his mother, a Chinese American poet. “Our Missing Hearts,” centers on Bird, a 12-year-old boy separated from his mother and growing up in a culture that requires him to disavow her. “I wanted to encourage readers to think about that question and think, ‘Well, is that something that's happening to someone else? Or is that our problem? Is this a problem that I can help with at all?’” “A lot of times we don't recognize that other people's problems are actual societal problems until it's staring us straight in the face,” Ng said. Celeste Ng’s latest novel, “Our Missing Hearts,” explores what happens when issues like separating families and banning books hit home.

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