Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng ** (of 4)

James Lee is an Asian-American who grew up in rural, 1940s and 1950s America ostracized and bullied for being the only Chinese person any schoolmate had ever seen. Marilyn grew up in the south, daughter of a teacher of Home Economics. Marilyn's mother wanted Marilyn to be a proper southern belle, but Marilyn wanted to be a doctor. Only it's the 1950s and Marilyn is derided by teachers and professors who believe science is too hard for girls. The two outcasts find one another at Harvard, where else?, marry and move to Ohio when James' promising career at Harvard is derailed because he is the "wrong kind of person." Marilyn is pregnant and does not graduate. Their dreams crushed, they raise four children in a small town in Ohio As the book opens, the children are as isolated, friendless, and lonely as their parents; the 16-year old daughter is dragged from the bottom of the town's lake, the victim of an apparent suicide. Marilyn, James, and the children are all drowning in regrets, despair, and inner turmoil they are unwilling to share with anyone. Sadness builds chapter after chapter.

Many readers and critics appear to have relished the fine writing and deep sorrow that Everything I Never Told You delivers; it received numerous minor awards and is being produced as a film, but seriously, why would anyone voluntarily submit to such a tsunami of despondency?