Imagine a household with unhealthy habits that most families had so often put off since the 1900s: uncommunicated expectations, displaced anger, generational trauma, and basically everything that makes a dysfunctional family relationship.

Now, put those all together and add the prejudice and discrimination experienced by Asians in America during the ’70s.

There, you now have this book.

Everything I Never Told You may not be your ideal contemporary fiction novel (not mine either), but it lets you see the world from a different cultural perspective. And I guess that's my favourite thing about it. As a firstborn Asian daughter living in a pressure cooker myself, it's not hard to sympathize with the Lee siblings and sometimes abhor their mom and dad. But the more I learned about their parents’ cross-cultural struggles and upbringing, the more I understand—not tolerate—their actions and behaviours.

Both parents and young adults alike can get so much from this book, so I highly, highly recommend it.