Little fires everywhere, by Celeste Ng

Shaker Heights, Ohio, is perfect.  A wealthy, planned community where the schools are excellent, all the children are above average, and the homes are color-coordinated by law.  But as the novel opens, one of those beautiful homes, the Richardson’s, is burning to the ground.  The pebble dropped into this placid surface may be Mia Warren, a young artist with a 15-year-old daughter, Pearl, who shows up in the town and rents the upper floor of the duplex that is owned by Mrs. Richardson (note, all duplexes look like single family homes with one entrance instead of two so as not to disturb the appearance of the street).  Mrs. Richardson, married to a successful lawyer, is a fourth generation Shaker resident and subscribes to the progressive, if somewhat repressive, tenets of her community.  She seems undisturbed that her oldest daughter, Lexie’s, boyfriend is African-American or that Lexie’s best friend is Serena Wong.  They are, after all, a very progressive community.  Mrs. Richardson, a journalist with the local paper is the mother of four children, one in each year at the high school.  Her younger son, Moody, befriends Pearl, and Pearl slowly becomes a fixture in the Richardson household, which also includes junior Trip, a handsome and charming athlete, and freshman Izzy, a surly, sullen, unhappy teen in Doc Martens.  The Richardson children’s lives couldn’t be more different from Pearl’s peripatetic life.  When a Chinese baby is abandoned at the local fire station, she seems to be the answer to the prayers of Mrs. Richardson’s best friend, Linda, who with her husband has tried unsuccessfully for years to have a baby of their own.  Then Mirabelle, nee Lily May’s, birth mother reappears and wants her child back.  Suddenly, things aren’t so progressive any more.  A thoughtful and thought-provoking book by an Asian-American who grew up there.  338 pp.