Our Missing Hearts by Celeste Ng
From the #1 bestselling author of Little Fires Everywhere, a deeply heart-wrenching novel about the unbreakable love between a mother and child in a society consumed by fear.
Twelve-year-old Bird Gardner lives a quiet existence with his loving but broken father, a former linguist who now shelves books in Harvard's library. He knows not to ask too many questions, stand out too much, stray too far. For a decade, their lives have been governed by laws written to preserve 'American culture' in the wake of years of economic instability and violence. To keep the peace and restore prosperity, the authorities are now allowed to relocate children of dissidents, especially those of Asian origin, and libraries have been forced to remove books seen as unpatriotic - including the work of Bird's mother, Margaret, a Chinese American poet who left the family when he was nine years old.
Bird has grown up disavowing his mother and her poems; he doesn't know her work or what happened to her, and he knows he shouldn't wonder. But when he receives a mysterious letter containing only a cryptic drawing, he is drawn into a quest to find her. His journey will take him through the many folktales she poured into his head as a child, through the ranks of an underground network of librarians, into the lives of the children who have been taken, and finally to New York, where a new act of defiance may be the beginning of much-needed change.
Our Missing Hearts is an old story made new, of the ways supposedly civilized communities can turn a blind eye to the most searing injustice. It's a story about the power - and limitations - of art to create change in the world, the lessons and legacies we pass onto our children, and how any of us can survive a broken world with our hearts intact.
Format: Paperback | 352 pages
Dimensions (cm): 23.4 x 15.3 x 2.6 | 538g -
Publication Date: 04 Oct 2022
Publisher: Little, Brown Book Group
Imprint: Abacus Books
Publication City/Country: London, United Kingdom
Language: English
Edition Number: 1
ISBN10: 1408716925
ISBN13: 9781408716922
Condition: Good
A book that has been read but is in good condition. Very minimal damage to the cover including a minor scuff marks on the bottom-right corner of the front cover, but no holes or tears. The majority of pages are undamaged with no creasing, but pages 9-62 have a patch of wrinkling on the bottom of the page, and pages 9-44 have tearing in the same spot. None of which compromises the legibility or understanding of the text. No pencil underlining of text, no highlighting of text and no writing in margins. No missing pages.