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A Novel
by Xhenet Aliu
In this unforgettable novel from the award-winning author of Brass, twins growing up in the United States in 1999 unravel larger truths about identity and sibling bonds when one of them gets wrapped up in the war in Kosovo.
Raised in Connecticut, adopted twins Drita and Petrit (aka Pete) had no connection to their Albanian heritage. Their lives were all about Barbie dolls, the mall, and roller skating at the local rink. Although they were inseparable during their childhood, their paths diverged once they became teenagers: Drita was a good girl with good manners who was going to attend a good college; Pete was a bad boy going nowhere fast. Even their twinhood was not enough to keep them together.
Fast-forward to their twenties. Drita has given up on her dreams for the future, abandoning her graduate studies to move back home and take care of their mother. She hasn't heard from Pete in three years when his girlfriend and their son unexpectedly show up without him and in need of help. Realizing that Pete's child may offer the siblings a second chance at being family, Drita becomes determined to find her brother. But what she ends up discovering—about their connection to their Albanian roots, the war in Kosovo, and the story of their adoption—will surprise everyone, and become what brings them together, or tears them apart for good.
In Everybody Says It's Everything, critically acclaimed author Xhenet Aliu tells the story of a family both fractured and foundering, desperate to connect with the other and the world at large, but not knowing how.
"Writing with warmth and sensitivity, compassion and a clear-eyed command of the narrative, [Aliu] brings empathy and generosity...Family is about more than blood in this tenderhearted and touching novel—a riveting read." —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"A glowing work of art. Aliu has used her many talents to craft a wonderful, vibrant, must-read book." —Jason Mott, National Book Award winning author of Hell of a Book, and New York Times bestselling author of The Returned
"Everybody Says It's Everything is a gut-punch of a novel, by turns tender and fierce, heartbreaking and hilarious. Albanian adoptees Drita and Pete hunger for belonging and purpose. Adrift, will they find themselves and their way back to each other? Against the backdrop of the Kosovo War, and set in Waterbury and in the Bronx, Xhenet Aliu deftly examines class, diaspora, loyalty, and family chosen and received. Powerful and deeply moving." —Vanessa Hua, author of Forbidden City
This information about Everybody Says It's Everything was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Xhenet Aliu's novel, Brass, was awarded the biennial Townsend Prize in 2020, the 2018 Georgia Author of the Year First Novel Prize, was a Barnes & Noble "Discover Great New Writers" selection, and was long-listed for the 2018 Center for Fiction First Book Prize. Numerous media outlets, including Entertainment Weekly, The San Francisco Chronicle, Real Simple, and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, named Brass a 2018 best book of the year. Previously, her debut story collection, Domesticated Wild Things, and Other Stories won the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Fiction. Aliu's writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Boston Globe, Glimmer Train, Hobart, LitHub, Buzzfeed, and elsewhere, and she has received fellowships from the Bread Loaf and Sewanee Writers' Conferences, a grant from ...
... Full Biography
Link to Xhenet Aliu's Website
Name Pronunciation
Xhenet Aliu: juh-NET ah-lee-OO
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