The Things We Never Say
Elizabeth Strout
Penguin, RRP $35.00

Reviewed by Wendy Tucker

I hardly dare to review this new novel by this highly acclaimed and most beloved author with a world-wide devoted readership. This is Strout’s (I want to call her Elizabeth because I feel I know her) eleventh novel and she is again long listed for the 2026 Booker Prize. She won the Pulitzer in 2009 for Olive Kitteridge and continues to be nominated for prestigious literary awards. Many of her characters reappear in subsequent companion works and some readers have come to regard these characters as personal friends. Such is the brilliance of her character
driven novels.

This novel is a departure in both the setting and with a new cast of characters. And I hope I will meet them again in future novels. We are still in small town America, but now on the coast of Massachusetts and in the bitter political backdrop of the 2024 election and its aftermath.

Our protagonist is Artie Dam who is 57, a history teacher, who loves both his subject and his students. He gives his time to his overlooked students, opens new ways of thought and gently corrects the cruelty of adolescent teasing. He is regarded as wise and kind by students, colleagues and friends alike, if occasionally ‘dopey’.

He married up, his wife of 30 years is Evie, a therapist. Evie comes from wealth and they live in the beautiful waterfront house that she inherited. Artie is not sure he belongs in this house.

He has a small sailboat and loves sailing in the bay. A pleasant life, by all appearances.

His beloved son, Rob, at 17, was the driver in an accident that killed his girlfriend’s friend, Heather. This tragedy hovers over the small family. Some of Artie’s friends have died or left town. He is becoming overwhelmed by feelings of isolation. He is in a world gone mad. ‘His country was committing suicide.’ Slowly Artie contemplates suicide, but only if his family and friends can believe it was an accident. He doesn’t want to upset them.

After a totally accidental almost drowning, Artie must live and change. He learns a life changing secret about his own life. Should he reveal this new knowledge or not. And does it matter? The secrets we keep and those we don’t and the people we love but never really know.

Artie learns what he needs to learn …

‘Why don’t people ever say anything real? Because to say anything real was to say things that nobody wanted to know. Or if they wanted to know, they would not care in the right way. Or even understand. It was a private thing to be alive. He understood this now.’

Strout is known for her minimalist prose, but she says more in one sentence than most in a chapter. Gentle yet fierce, kind yet simmering. No one is ordinary. We are extraordinary creatures, if only we could know each other.