Celeste Ng ( ) (born July 30, 1980) is an American writer and novelist.
She has released many short stories that have been published in a variety of literary journals.
Ng's first novel, ''
Everything I Never Told You'', released on June 26, 2014 won the
Amazon Book of the Year award
as well as praise from critics. Ng's short story ''Girls at Play'' won a
Pushcart Prize in 2012, and was a 2015 recipient of an
Alex Award
The Alex Awards annually recognize "ten books written for adults that have special appeal to young adults ages 12 through 18". Essentially, the award is a listing by the American Library Association parallel to its annual Best Books for Young A ...
. Her second novel, ''
Little Fires Everywhere,'' was published in 2017. Ng received a
Guggenheim Fellowship in 2020. Her most recent novel, ''Our Missing Hearts'', was released on October 4, 2022.
Early life and education
Celeste Ng was born in
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Western Pennsylvania, the second-most populous city in Pennsylva ...
.
Her parents moved from
Hong Kong
Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delta i ...
in the late 1960s.
Her father Dr. Daniel L. Ng (d. 2004) was a physicist at
NASA
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil List of government space agencies, space program ...
in the
John H. Glenn Research Center (formerly known as the NASA Lewis Research Center).
Her mother was a chemist who taught at
Cleveland State University.
When Ng was ten years old, she moved from Pittsburgh to
Shaker Heights, Ohio
Shaker Heights is a city in Cuyahoga County, Ohio, United States. As of the 2020 Census, the city population was 29,439. Shaker Heights is an inner-ring streetcar suburb of Cleveland, abutting the eastern edge of the city's limits. In July 1911, a ...
with her parents and sister.
She attended the schools in the
Shaker Heights City School District
The Shaker Heights City School District is a school district headquartered in Shaker Heights, Ohio, United States, in Greater Cleveland. The system serves all residents of the city of Shaker Heights and about of the City of Cleveland around Sha ...
, from
Woodbury Elementary all the way up to
Shaker Heights High School.
At Shaker Heights High School, Ng was involved with the Student Group on Race Relations ("SGORR") for three years and was a co-editor of the school's literary magazine, ''Semanteme''.
She graduated from high school in 1998.
After graduating from high school, Ng studied English at
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...
. She then attended graduate school at
University of Michigan
, mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth"
, former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821)
, budget = $10.3 billion (2021)
, endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...
, where she earned her
Master of Fine Arts in writing, now the
Helen Zell Writers’ Program. At the University of Michigan, Ng won the
Hopwood Award
The Hopwood Awards are a major scholarship program at the University of Michigan, founded by Avery Hopwood.
Under the terms of the will of Avery Hopwood, a prominent American dramatist and member of the class of 1905 of the University of Michigan, ...
for her short story "What Passes Over".
Career
Ng received the
Pushcart Prize in 2012 for her story "Girls, At Play". Her fiction has appeared in ''
One Story
''One Story'' is a literary magazine which publishes 12 issues a year, each issue containing a single short story. The magazine was founded in 2002 by writers Hannah Tinti
Hannah Tinti (born 1973) is an American writer and the co-founder of '' ...
'', ''
TriQuarterly
''TriQuarterly'' is a name shared by an American literary magazine and a series of books, both operating under the aegis of Northwestern University Press. The journal is published twice a year and features fiction, nonfiction, poetry, drama, liter ...
'', and ''
Subtropics''. Her essays have appeared in ''
Kenyon Review Online'', ''
The Millions
''The Millions'' is an online literary magazine created by C. Max Magee in 2003. It contains articles about literary topics and book reviews.
''The Millions'' has several regular contributors as well as frequent guest appearances by literary no ...
'', and elsewhere. Ng taught writing at the University of Michigan and at
Grub Street
Until the early 19th century, Grub Street was a street close to London's impoverished Moorfields district that ran from Fore Street east of St Giles-without-Cripplegate north to Chiswell Street. It was pierced along its length with narrow ent ...
in
Boston
Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...
.
Ng also was an editor of blogs at the website
Fiction Writers Review for three years.
Ng's debut novel, ''
Everything I Never Told You: A Novel'', is a literary thriller that focuses on an American family in 1970s Ohio. The novel had four drafts and one revision before completion, which took six years. Working on it, Ng said she drew upon her own experiences of racism as well as her family and friends.
The book, which the ''
Los Angeles Times
The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the U ...
'' called an "excellent first novel about family, love, and ambition," won Amazon’s
book of the year award in 2014
and was a
''New York Times'' Notable Book of 2014. It has been translated into 15 languages.
In 2020, it was reported that
Annapurna Television would develop the novel into a limited series. Ng and Mary Lee of production company A-Major Media will serve as executive producers.
Ng's second novel, ''
Little Fires Everywhere'', is set in Shaker Heights, Ohio, and follows two families, one a mother and daughter, that challenge the boundaries and culture of the town.
The novel was developed into a 2020
Hulu miniseries of the same name starring and executive produced by
Reese Witherspoon
Laura Jeanne Reese Witherspoon (born March 22, 1976) is an American actress and producer. The recipient of various accolades, including an Academy Award, a British Academy Film Award, a Primetime Emmy Award, and two Golden Globe Awards, she ...
and
Kerry Washington
Kerry Marisa Washington (born January 31, 1977) SidebarCertificate of Live Birth: Isabelle Amarachi Asomugha(County of Los Angeles Department of Public Health). Gives Kerry Washington birth dateArchivedfrom the original on May 2, 2016.Note: Fi ...
; Ng also served as one of the show's producers.
Personal life
As of 2014, Ng resides in
Cambridge, Massachusetts
Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. As part of the Boston metropolitan area, the cities population of the 2020 U.S. census was 118,403, making it the fourth most populous city in the state, behind Boston ...
, with her husband and son.
While on a book tour for ''Everything I Never Told You'', Ng said her favorite book as a child was ''
Harriet the Spy
''Harriet the Spy'' is a children's novel written and illustrated by Louise Fitzhugh that was published in 1964. It has been called "a milestone in children's literature" and a "classic". In the U.S., it ranked number 12 in the 50 Best Books fo ...
''.
As an adult, one of her favorite books is ''
The God of Small Things
''The God of Small Things'' is a family drama novel written by Indian writer Arundhati Roy. Roy's debut novel, it is a story about the childhood experiences of fraternal twins whose lives are destroyed by the "Love Laws" prevalent in 1960s Ker ...
'' by
Arundhati Roy
Suzanna Arundhati Roy (born 24 November 1961) is an Indian author best known for her novel ''The God of Small Things'' (1997), which won the Booker Prize for Fiction in 1997 and became the best-selling book by a non-expatriate Indian author. S ...
.
In 2018, when the American government separated the children and parents of undocumented immigrant families, Ng used her Twitter account to call attention to the policy. Ng and a group of other writers auctioned naming rights of future characters in their books. The goal was to raise money for Immigrant Families Together, a volunteer group dedicated to reuniting migrant families.
Bibliography
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References
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Ng, Celeste
1980 births
Living people
People from Shaker Heights, Ohio
American people of Hong Kong descent
American women writers of Chinese descent
21st-century American novelists
21st-century American women writers
American novelists of Chinese descent
American women novelists
Harvard University alumni
University of Michigan alumni