The gripping and extraordinarily moving new novel from the internationally bestselling Celeste Ng.
Twelve-year-old Bird Gardner lives a quiet existence with his loving father, a former linguist who now shelves books in a university library. His mother Margaret, a Chinese American poet, left without a trace when he was nine years old. He doesn't know what happened to her-only that her books have been banned-and he resents that she cared more about her work than about him.
Then one day, Bird receives a mysterious letter containing only a cryptic drawing, and soon he is pulled into a quest to find her. His journey will take him back to the many folktales she poured into his head as a child, through the ranks of an underground network of heroic librarians, and finally to New York City, where he will finally learn the truth about what happened to his mother, and what the future holds for them both.
Our Missing Hearts is an old story made new, of the ways supposedly civilized communities can ignore the most searing injustice. It's about the lessons and legacies we pass on to our children, and the power of art to create change.
Review
Celeste Ng's new novel, Our Missing Hearts, comes out this autumn and you can bet I will be cracking that spine open the second I get my hands on it. Ng is an auto-buy author for me. I can't wait to see what she's going to do next ― Taylor Jenkins Reid, The Times
Working in the tradition of The Handmaid's Tale and 1984, Our Missing Hearts is at its core a parable about the wages of fear, how it can lead to bigotry, racism and institutionalized hatred...The notion of the accidental warrior is one of the many generous and compassionate aspects of Ng's story - the idea that there is something brave in everyone - if only it can be reached ― Washington Post
Ng excels at narrative tension and at mustering readers' fear and outrage...Like George Orwell, Margaret Atwood, Kazuo Ishiguro and Octavia E. Butler, Ng pays close enough attention to write tomorrow's headlines ― San Francisco Chronicle
The poetic prose captures the poignancy of the story which is both heartbreaking and hopeful ― Buzz mag
Celeste Ng imagines a terrifying dystopian future ― Time magazine
Instantly gripping and heartbreaking ― Autumn's Best Blockbuster Reads, Evening Standard
Heart-wrenching and brilliant ― Boston Globe
So much of this utterly stupendous tale is hauntingly, horrifically, historically, currently all too real...Yet Ng creates an exquisite story of unbreakable family bonds, lifesaving storytelling (and seemingly omniscient librarians!), brilliantly subversive art, and accidentally transformative activism. As lyrical as it is chilling, as astonishing as it is empathic, Our Missing Hearts arguably achieves literary perfection ― Booklist, starred review
Ng crafts an affecting family drama out of the chilling and charged atmosphere, and shines especially when offering testimony to the power of art and storytelling... Like Margaret's story, Ng's latest crackles and sizzles all the way to the end ― Publishers Weekly, starred review
Easily one of the most anticipated novels of the year! ― Bookriot
An eerie, prophetic novel...[that] showcases Ng's own ingenuity and range. Brilliantly envisioned and filled with Ng's signature tender, intimate character work and complex family dynamics, this coming-of-age story asks what it means to be a good parent or a good citizen when every child is at risk, as well as what power art has to challenge injustice ― Shelf Awareness
