Read in 2024 - 20: Our Missing Hearts

Our Missing Hearts

Celeste Ng

Borrowed as a paperback from a friend with whom I more or less regularly exchange books, this has been the best work of fiction I have read so far this year.

The story picks up on the ancient topics of blaming others for things that go wrong ("The woman you created, she gave me the fruit!"), on how much freedom we need versus how much safety and security we want, on the relationships between parents and children, on oppression disguised as it being for a good cause.

Set in a very near future (no year is given, but the reader understands that this could be more or less our present time) in the US, the story follows 12-year-old Noah Gardner, or Bird as he called himself when he was little, on the quest to find his mother who left him and his Dad three years ago.

The dystopian scenario shows a US-American society that has left a series of terrible events, collectively named The Crisis, behind, the apparent return to normality being heavily regulated by PACT, a law introduced by the government and backed by the vast majority of people to keep "American values" and their society safe. China is the enemy, seen as the main cause for The Crisis, and in its wake, anything even remotely Asian is perceived as a potential threat. 

People with Asian heritage obvious in their surnames or their faces are treated as second-class citizens, often subject to abuse ranging from the verbal to the physical.

Bird's mother is the daughter of Chinese-American parents, but so far Bird has escaped the worst abuse, protected by his father who has been raising him alone since his mother left.

One day an enigmatic letter arrives, and it can only be from his mother. It sets Bird on a journey to find her, and along the way, he discovers a secret network of heroic librarians and is reunited with a good friend.

Whether the dictatorial society is going to change for the better after the events in the last part of the book is left to the reader's imagination.

There is a lot of food for thought in this book, and sadly, the PACT-ruled society is not so unlikely - a lot sounds way too familiar in the way people think, talk and treat each other. It was my first read by Celeste Ng, but probably not my last. Her writing style truly resonates with me, it is clear, concise and poetic at the same time.

You can find out more about the author on wikipedia or her own website, and about the book and its background.

I highly recommend "Our Missing Hearts" - not just to Librarians!