Today's Featured Book:
The Things We Never Say: A Novel
by Elizabeth Strout
Genre: Fiction
Published: May 5, 2026
Page Count: 207 pages
Summary:
Artie Dam is living a double life. He spends his days teaching history to eleventh graders, expanding their young minds, correcting their casual cruelties, and lending a kind word to those who need it most. He goes to holiday parties with his wife of three decades, makes small talk with neighbors, and, on weekends, takes his sailboat out on the beautiful Massachusetts Bay. He is, by all appearances, present and alive. But inside, Artie is plagued by feelings of isolation. He looks out at a world gone mad—at himself and the people around him—and turns a question over and over in his mind: How is it that we know so little about one another, even those closest to us?
And then, one day, Artie learns that life has been keeping a secret from him, one that threatens to upend his entire world. Once he learns it, he is forced to chart a new course, to reconsider the relationships he holds most dear—and to make peace with the mysteries at the heart of our existence.
Elizabeth Strout, as we have come to expect, delivers a moving exploration of the human condition—one that brims with compassion for each and every one of her indelible characters.
It was the middle of June and the sun all day had kept right on shining with sweet mightiness. "Stay jovial, please, Artie! Just promise me that. Please stay your old jovial self!" Flossie MacDonald had wiped her napkin across her weeping eyes and told this to Artie Dam the last time she had seen him, which had been on this spectacular evening in June. And he assured her that he would.
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So blind we humans are---so blind. To each other and to ourselves, moving through life as though through shadows, putting a hand in the dark and thinking we have touched someone. And maybe we have, as Artie did with Rhonda Lazarre that day. But mostly we travel through life unsighted, grasping only the smallest details of one another's selves, including our own. Thinking all the while that we can see.
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Secrets. Feelings we hide. Things we have done we do not talk about. What we think we know. People we have known deeply and yet really have not known at all.
And why do we do these things? Is it fated? Where do the words, the thoughts, the actions, the feelings come from?
How do we help others as we go through our lives? Are we helping them? What should we tell them and what should we keep silent about?
A good book sticks with me. I keep thinking about it after I've come to THE END. I want others to read it and talk about it. Elizabeth Strout's books are good books for me. This one may be my new favorite.
The purpose of THE BOOK BLOGGER HOP is to give bloggers a chance to follow other blogs, learn about new books, and befriend other bloggers. THE BOOK BLOGGER HOP is hosted by Ramblings of a Coffee Addicted Writer.
If you could pick any fictional character to live with, who would it be, and how would they change your daily life? (submitted by Billy @ Coffee-Addicted Writer)
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