Little Fires Everywhere Summary

Little res everywhere Chapter 1 On a Saturday afternoon in May 1997, in the planned suburban community of Shaker Heights, Ohio, Mrs. Elena Richardson, still in her robe, watches from the lawn as a re blazes through her house. The night before, the tenants in a rental property she owns —Mia and her teenage daughter Pearl—had dropped off the key to the property in her mailbox and moved out. That day had been a dif cult one for Mrs. Richardson, so she had decided to sleep in. When she was awakened by the smoke detectors, she searched the bedrooms for three of her children—Lexie, a senior in high school; Trip, a junior; and Moody, a sophomore. But she did not search for her fourth child—Izzy, a freshman. None of the children were in the house, but Mrs. Richardson saw a re burning in the middle of each bed. By the time the re department has the blaze under control, Lexie, Trip, and Moody have come home, but Izzy is nowhere to be found. As they watch smoke billow from the house, Lexie, Trip, and Moody assume that Izzy, the troublemaker of the family, set the re. Mr. Richardson returns home from work. Chapter 2 The story moves back to eleven months earlier, June 1996. Mia Warren, an artist, and her fteen-year-old daughter, Pearl, move into the upstairs oor of Mrs. Richardson’s rental property. The wealthy Richardsons don’t need the rental income, but Mrs. Richardson rents to people she feels are needy and deserving. Mia and Pearl soon learn the many rules that regulate life in Shaker Heights. They do not have much money and so also learn where they can buy things on discount and pick up discarded belongings. Curious about these new tenants—especially Pearl, whom Mrs. Richardson calls “brilliant”—Moody rides his bike over to their home and sees Pearl arranging the pieces of a bed on the front lawn. She lies down among the pieces, and Mia takes her picture from her second- oor window. Pearl then acknowledges that Moody has been watching and asks if he wants to help. Together they bring the pieces to her bedroom, where Pearl skillfully assembles the bed with tools. Pearl tells Moody she has never had her own room before and, to herself, remembers the many places she and her mother have lived. Moody feels impressed and attracted to her and asks what she is doing the next day. Chapter 3 In the weeks following their rst meeting, Moody shows Pearl all around Shaker Heights. He, in turn, learns about Mia and Pearl’s lifestyle. Mia has a part-time job at the Chinese restaurant Lucky Palace. While earning just enough to get by, she shops at thrift stores, brings home leftover food from the restaurant, and repurposes old bedsheets. Pearl tells Moody that her mother’s real job is her art—she takes photographs and then doctors the negatives or prints to convey different meanings. Sometimes she creates unusual objects and photographs them. Her photographs are sold by Anita, a friend and gallery owner in New York, but Mia refuses to go to New York herself. When Mia nishes a project, which may take four to six months, she and Pearl go on the road again, sometimes sleeping in their car, until they nd a new spot to live where Mia feels inspired. This time, however, Mia has promised Pearl they will stay in Shaker Heights. Moody feels enthralled with Pearl and decides the only way he can keep her interest is to introduce her to his family. When Pearl enters the Richardsons’ household for the rst time, they strike her as the perfect image of a family. Chapter 4 The Richardsons warmly welcome Pearl, and she begins spending a great deal of time at their house. To Pearl, they seem effortlessly con dent and beautiful. The house itself and all its trappings suggest a permanence that Pearl has not known. Mrs. Richardson especially is affectionate toward Pearl, who is impressed that Mrs. Richardson works as a reporter for a local newspaper. At rst, Mia feels pleased that Pearl and Moody have become friends, but later she becomes concerned by Pearl’s infatuation with the Richardsons. When school starts, Pearl and Moody—both sophomores—share many classes. After school, Pearl goes to the Richardson house to watch TV with Moody, Lexie, and Trip. Izzy stays upstairs. Pearl develops a crush on Trip and sits next to him on the couch every day, with Moody claiming her other side. Lexie and Trip ridicule Izzy, but Moody defends her. Lexie and Trip share stories about Izzy’s odd behavior. Lexie insists she doesn’t see race because her boyfriend Brian is Black. Lexie asks Pearl if she knows who her father is, something Pearl has long wondered about. Once, Pearl even asked Mia if she had been wanted as a baby, to which Mia, crying, answered yes. Chapter 5 Lexie begins to take an interest in Pearl, who she feels is timid, quiet, and somewhat pitiful. She brings Pearl to the mall to buy clothes, but Pearl, not having much money, suggests they go to the thrift store. Lexie also gives Pearl some of her own clothes. Trip notices Pearl’s changed appearance and compliments her. Moody gives Pearl a blank notebook in which she can write her poetry, partly to counteract Trip’s attention. One day, Lexie suggests that she and Pearl go to Pearl’s home after school. Moody comes along, resentful of Lexie’s presence. Mia feels somewhat upset to see them, not liking outsiders to come into her home, but acts friendly and makes popcorn as the teens talk. Lexie explains that she’s applying to Yale; she likes the idea of being a train ride away from Princeton, where her boyfriend Brian will be attending. However, she complains about having to write an essay that retells a story from a different perspective. When Lexie thinks of rewriting “Rumpelstiltskin” with the miller’s daughter as the villain for not giving up her baby as promised, Mia loudly disagrees and leaves the room. Pearl offers to write an essay for Lexie, who happily accepts. Chapter 6 Pearl writes Lexie’s college essay, and every day she wears clothes or makeup Lexie has given her, which bothers Mia and Moody. To reward Pearl for writing the essay, Lexie invites her to a friend’s Halloween party. When Trip says he is also going, Pearl accepts, reneging on a promise she had made to Moody to watch a movie together. At the party, everyone drinks, mostly to excess. Pearl spots Trip and waits to talk to him, but soon he disappears. Meanwhile, Lexie’s boyfriend Brian shows up, and the two leave together, planning to have sex for the rst time. Deserted and a little drunk, Pearl calls Moody. Though too young to have his license, Moody drives his mother’s car to pick Pearl up and drive her home. The next Tuesday, Mrs. Richardson stops by Mia and Pearl’s home to check on them and her property. She’s impressed by Mia’s photographs hanging on the walls, but there is little furniture, and she feels both uneasy and intrigued by Mia’s different lifestyle. Mrs. Richardson offers Mia a part-time job cleaning and cooking at the Richardson house. Mia sees that there is no way she can refuse, but she also sees the job as a way of again becoming a part of Pearl’s life, so she accepts. Chapter 7 Pearl feels upset that Mia will be coming to the Richardsons’ house. Mia cleans the house in the morning, when the family is away, goes home to work on her art, and then returns at ve to cook dinner. One morning, Izzy appears in the kitchen while Mia is cleaning. Izzy was suspended from school for breaking the music teacher’s bow and throwing it in her face. Mia makes Izzy a broiled sugar sandwich as Izzy explains that Mrs. Peters, the music teacher, had picked on and humiliated a shy Black student. Mia then asks Izzy what she is going to do about it, which startles Izzy. Three days later, Pearl and Moody stop Izzy from toiler-papering Mrs. Peters’s house. Mia explains that targeting Mrs. Peters alone will only get Izzy in more trouble. Izzy plans a different revenge and talks Moody and Pearl into helping her. They stick toothpicks into all the door locks at school, jamming them shut. Chaos erupts, and the custodian needs several hours to dislodge all the toothpicks. Locked out of the teachers’ lounge, Mrs. Peters reluctantly uses the girls’ bathroom. But having waited too long, she urinates on the oor, sending girls giggling from the room. Izzy becomes fascinated by Mia and tells Mia she wants to be her assistant. Feeling a connection with Izzy, Mia agrees. Chapter 8 Every day after school, Izzy walks to Mia’s house to be with her, while Pearl walks to the Richardsons’ to be with Lexie, Trip, and Moody. While working at the Richardsons’, Mia has noticed that Mrs. Richardson is hard on Izzy and critical of her, whereas Mia compliments Izzy and supports her. One day in November, Pearl and Moody go to the art museum on a class eld trip. They see a photograph of Mia holding a baby in her arms. After school, they return to the museum with Lexie and Izzy to see the photo again. When Pearl asks Mia about the photo, Mia suddenly becomes distant. She implies that she may have modeled for the photograph when she was an art student and that she doesn’t recognize the photographer’s name, Pauline Hawthorne. That night, Mia doesn’t kiss Pearl good night for the rst time ever. Izzy, determined to learn about the photograph and Mia, researches Pauline Hawthorne and discovers she was a famous photographer. Izzy then asks her mother to nd out more. Mrs. Richardson tracks down Anita Rees, the New York art dealer who sold the photograph. But Anita refuses to tell her anything and hangs up. Mrs. Richardson decides the search is not worth her time. Chapter 9 Izzy, a dif cult baby and strong-willed child, had been born prematurely with major health concerns. Not only was Mrs. Richardson constantly anxious about Izzy, but Izzy upset Mrs. Richardson’s sense of control over her life. Consequently, Mrs. Richardson has unwittingly tried to restrain Izzy while constantly criticizing her. The weekend after Thanksgiving, the Richardsons attend a birthday party at the McCulloughs’ house for their baby, Mirabelle, a Chinese infant who was left at a re station ten months earlier. The McCulloughs, unable to have a baby of their own, are in the process of adopting Mirabelle. At the party, Mrs. Richardson reprimands Izzy when she criticizes Mrs. McCullough for giving the baby a new name—a note with the baby said her name was May Lin. Lexie takes an extreme interest in baby Mirabelle. When she tells Mia about Mirabelle, Mia immediately thinks of Bebe Chow, a young Chinese woman she works with at the restaurant. A year earlier, Bebe had a baby girl but was abandoned by the baby’s father. Poor, jobless, and unable to care for her baby, Bebe left her at a re station. Later, Bebe tried to nd the baby but was told she had given up her rights. Mia phones Bebe to tell her about Mirabelle. Chapter 10 Bebe comes to Mia and Pearl’s home, frantic and sobbing. She tells them she called the McCulloughs and said she was May Lin’s mother, but Mrs. McCullough hung up on her. She then went to their house, but the McCulloughs called the police. Mia advises her to go to a TV station with her story. The story appears on Channel 3 on Wednesday night, and Thursday a reporter and cameraman from a second station appear at the McCulloughs’ house. Mrs. McCullough slams the door, but the story begins to dominate the news. Upset, Mrs. McCullough recalls how hard she and her husband have tried to have a baby—she suffered seven miscarriages. Ed Lim, a local lawyer, offers to represent Bebe in a custody ght for her daughter. Mr. Richardson agrees to help the McCulloughs’ lawyers, leading to an argument at the Richardsons’ dinner table. Izzy sides with Bebe, and Mrs. Richardson angrily tells her to go to her room. The next Sunday, while reading about the story in the newspaper, Mrs. Richardson realizes it was Mia who informed Bebe about the baby’s whereabouts. She resolves to investigate Mia’s past. Chapter 11 Mrs. Richardson learns that Pauline Hawthorne taught photography in New York and had a student named Mia Wright. When Lexie is accepted at Yale, Mrs. Richardson suggests a celebratory brunch and invites Pearl, hoping to get more information from her. Pearl tells her she was born in San Francisco but does not know where Mia comes from. Mrs. Richardson gets a copy of Pearl’s birth certi cate from San Francisco. No father’s name is given, but the birthplace of the mother—Mia Warren—is listed as Bethel Park, Pennsylvania. When Mrs. Richardson contacts the city records department there, she learns there is no Mia Warren but there is a Mia Wright as well as a Warren Wright. After more research, Mrs. Richardson learns that Warren Wright was a young athlete killed in 1982 in a car accident. She concludes that Mia Warren is actually Mia Wright and nds an address for George and Regina Wright. Meanwhile, the custody case for May Lin/Mirabelle is controversial. Some people think the baby belongs with the McCulloughs because they have given her a loving home. Others think she belongs with Bebe because she should grow up in her birth culture. The court grants Bebe visitation rights until the case is settled. Mrs. Richardson becomes angry at Mia for stirring up such trouble and decides to visit Mia’s parents.