Reviews with content warning for Xenophobia - Todo lo que no te conté

A solid debut, even better, an amazing book that left me breathless when I read that it was her debut novel.

I didn't expect to feel sorry for every single character and somehow understand their decisions and words even though I didn't agree or particularly liked them, e.g.

their father's harsh words towards Nath, how they completely forget about Hannah's existence throughout the whole novel (it made me tear up a bit, I wanted to hug her and tell her I would listen to her) or the affair or how her mother refused to see the truth. But still, it made me feel worse about them and think "damn, they really deserve a hug and a cookie, this is really tough and they are trying their best to pull together themselves, this must have been heartbreaking, losing a child/sister is definitely not easy and it breaks families apart..."

I felt most sorry for the kids, since a lot of the times, they just suffered the consequences of their parent's traumas, like how James treated so bad Nath because he was afraid he would be like him, how Marilyn put so much pressure into her daughter and didn't spare a moment to think about what Lydia wanted all along.

So, I felt mostly sorry for Lydia, Hannah, Nath and also Jack, since he took the blame because he knew that was what Nath needed and tried to help Lydia.

Lydia's story, her thoughts, feelings and actions were so desperate that I couldn't hate her for her family when she died. I felt suffocated reading her emotions and I think the worst scenes were the lake ones. All the scenes around the lake were so hard to read, especially Lydia's and Nath's at the end of the novel.

Celeste's writing style is beautiful, the pace is good, the emotions are also really good. She doesn't give as many details as I might have liked, however I felt that it was perfect for the novel. Leaving some things unsaid. I would definitely love to re-read this in the future and spend more time digesting every line because I didn't stop for hours until I reached the end because I needed to know more about the characters, about why Lydia did what she did, about how each and one of them dealt with the pain and the grief.

I think this novel surely served it's purpose. It was a character-driven novel, focused on the family of Lydia rather than just Lydia's story, giving us both the parents and brother/sister's reactions, which was really nice. The writing style was also pleasing, the pace felt perfect and what I expected more was the issue about identity, feeling lost because you feel different, and the race conflict (? I dont know how to explain it without making too many spoilers, but it is definitely one of the key points of the novel and the reason why I picked this book up (and also because it's centered around a family and I love family dynamics)) etc. It was precisely the reason why I picked this book, because I wanted to read more about this topic, to get informed and it was such a shock to see how not that long ago mixed marriages were seen as something horrible and the type of comments James (and the kids also) received. It made me feel really sad and angry. I think I can now understand a bit better the issues and the type of thoughts people in these situations have.

I didn't think I would give this book 5 stars but after finishing the last sentence I just felt like it was the right thing to do since it gave me all I asked and more and it was so well done. I have not a single complain about this book, nothing to pinpoint. It was a really solid book and I am so glad I stumbled upon it on a youtube video about these type of recommendations, because there's no translation to my native language and I wouldn't probably have heard of it if I didn't try to seek for gems like this from time to time.

Please, Mrs Celeste Ng, if you want to and can, don't stop writing and providing us with such delightful but tearful stories

Content Warnings