Unhealthy Father Son Relationships In 'Everything I Never Told You'

Relations Can Ruin Life Developing a harmonious relationship with your parents is crucial to an enjoyable childhood. Sadly, not everyone gets to develop a bond and get this experience. Celeste Ng uses many different examples of this in the story Everything I Never Told You, and a key instance is between Nath and James. James is already unhappy with how he can’t fit in since he is Chinese in a small American town and when realizing the same goes for Nath, their bond ultimately diminishes. Throughout the novel Everything I Never Told You, Ng uses the conflict James has with Nath because of his poor childhood experiences to show how unhealthy father-son relationships can ruin many necessities of life. From the very beginning, it is evident

At first, it wasn’t all that bad, with James’s favoritism being evident toward Lydia, but over time James notices Nath less and less until he is almost out of the picture. Finally, when Nath gets an acceptance letter from Harvard, James smiles at him and this is shocking to Lydia since “[s]he could not remember the last time he had smiled at Nath like that” (170). Clearly, James has not been following up with Nath’s life and only just recently thinks to congratulate him because he achieves something many dream of. Even so, he barely gives a reaction, showing he truly doesn't care about Nath and would much rather focus on himself or even his beloved Lydia. Furthermore, after Lydia’s tragic death, the whole family falls apart and James leaves to get time away from the family. When returning, Nath questions why James smells of perfume and this makes James snap and say, “[d]on’t you talk to me that way. Don’t you question me. You don’t know anything about my life” (198). Nath did nothing wrong by asking a simple question, yet James is now furious. James couldn't care less about how Nath views him as a father now, and it truly shows how a good relationship is far beyond an arm's