Review - The Things We Never Say by Elizabeth Strout

Title: The Things We Never Say*

Author: Elizabeth Strout

Rating: 4 stars / 5 stars

*This post contains affiliate links. If you make purchases after using these links, I will earn a percentage of your purchase without any further cost to you. 

Favorite Quote: “And yet Artie still felt a lingering sense of shame. He had lied to his students, They could not bring about world peace. No one could.” Strout, Elizabeth. The Things We Never Say. Random House, 2026, pg. 83. 

Review: The Things We Never Say follows a teacher, Artie Dam, who [SPOILER ALERT] contemplates suicide until a near-fatal accident leads him to re-evaluate his life. He also learns that his son is not biologically related to him after an affair his wife had decades ago. In the background of the novel is the Trump administration and America’s descent into facism.

I’ve read a few novels by Strout by now, by no means her whole backlog, but enough to get a feel for Strout’s style, and part of what is intriguing about this book is the slight, but perceivable, deviation from her normal style. When I think of Strout, I think of beautiful writing, explorations of relationships, but subtle (some might say nonexistent) plots. The Things We Never Say is still very much an internal novel. Readers know far more about Dam’s internal life than anyone else. But outside of him, readers are also aware of not just hints of what is going on outside of his experience, but entire plot lines. We know his wife cheated. We know his son has struggled with Dam’s paternity (or lack thereof) and also his own relationship struggles. And we know that America is happening in the background. 

So what’s working? Strout has always been a wordsmith. At a sentence to sentence level, this novel is brilliant, as are so many of her others. Beyond that, the fullness of her characters really stand out in this book. No one’s perfect, but that’s, in some ways, what makes them good (I didn’t care for his wife, but even she was a well-rounded character). The expansive world outside of the novel that is omnipresent, even if the characters aren’t engaging with it on the page is also incredibly striking. [SPOILER ALERT/TRIGGER WARNING] The suicide of the principal later shows just how the external world can turn personal (and is a powerful, subtle comparison to the people willing to hide Jewish people - and other people targeted by the Nazis). 

So what wasn’t working? I know I just talked about how having a more visible plot was a positive in this novel, but there were certain things that just felt unnecessary, which, given how short this novel already is, shows that Strout can write something short yet powerful. The shoplifting/stealing scenes exhibited by Artie and the son’s maybe/sort-of girlfriend are one example. They didn’t add anything to the plot. 

About that Quote: It was hard to choose a favorite quote in this book. Some were more dramatic. Some were more true to Artie’s character. But at the end, I think, for even such a small book, there’s still a way to condense it into one sentence and this is it. Artie spent much of the novel trying to balance his existential dread with remaining a steadfast educator whose beliefs are rooted in the goodness the potential of his students. And yet - even if they are good and even if they have potential, the world isn’t always and doesn’t always. 

Have you read The Things We Never Say? Share your thoughts below!

(Incomplete) list of TWs: suicide, character death, racism, infidelity, fertility issues