Flawless Characters of Little Fires Everywhere (Not Sarcastic)

A quick glance at the flawed but believable characters in Little Fires Everywhere—their faults—because I’m a pessimist. Lightning round!

Mrs. Richardson—Bitch. Well…sort of. She’s kind of like my mom. Helicopter parent, always needing to know what’s going on and bitching if she doesn’t. Unlike my mother, however, Mrs. Richardson is so incredibly quick to judge. What? No, don’t give me that “b-but it was her environment growing up in Shaker Heights! She could totally be a good person! What about her final regrets?” You are so dumb. Izzy, her own child, was able to see everything wrong with this perfectly planned society, yet Elena, with almost three times as much life experience, was unable to see it. 

Izzy Richardson—Brainded. Oh wow! I want to inspire change! I know, I’ll vandalize the locks in my school to make my teacher who is mean piss herself. This is totally intentional and planned, and I totally knew she would be the one most affected by my misdemeanor. Okay but side note from this pessimistic character I’m playing, this was kinda lame by Celeste Ng. If you want the “evil” teacher to be punished, do it in a way where she is personally targeted and that’s somewhat believable. I loved how Little Fires Everywhere was believable. Except when it wasn’t.

Lexie Richardson—A.K.A. Stacy, Brittany, or Tiffany. Can be used interchangeably. Lexie is actually a character with more depth than a Stacy, Brittany, or Tiffany, but falls into the same traps that they do. Cares way too much about the opinions of others without realizing it, thinks she has it all figured out. Pretty basic! Not a lot here. Not much to talk about. I guess the depth comes from her bad experiences, like the abortion, so I’m not sure I can give her a lot of credit. 

Trip Richardson—A.K.A. Chad, Brad, or Brock. Can be used interchangeably. Trip is an absolute unit. Athletic. Jawline. He even has black Nike tube socks that turn girls like Pearl on. Trip is kinda like Lexie in how there isn’t a lot here for me to critique, other than him being a total Chad. Low-hanging fruit.

Moody Richardson—Beta. 

Mr. Richardson—Boring. Strikes me as the dad who grills but isn’t particularly good at it, just does it to keep up with the dad across the street who grills and has a slightly hotter wife. Hard to imagine that in this instance as Mrs. Richardson is being played by Reese Witherspoon in the new Hulu series. She’s hot.

Mia Warren—Total virgin. Well actually, wait no I’m not going there. Mia is the least easy to criticize. I genuinely don’t know what I dislike about her or if I even dislike her. Let me think…nah, she’s cool.

Pearl—Gonna have to go with the Mia thing here and say that I honestly don’t hate Pearl. I do think she is a little bit too horny though and I do not support the fetishism of feet.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m just messing around here. I actually loved Little Firees Everywhere, even more than Atonement, and I think I’d give it a solid 47/50 on my previously defined objective literature scale. The characters, although sometimes really easy to hate, were so human. More human than any book we’ve read so far in AP, and I think Celeste Ng did a really great job in that regard.