Everything Sad is Untrue (a true story) by Daniel Nayeri

Everything Sad is Untrue is a contemporary fiction novel, styled as a memoir, written for ages 12 and up. I will review this book in the category of Printz Award winner.

Everything Sad is Untrue is interesting because, though it is classified as a work of fiction, it is a collection of the author Daniel Nayeri's experiences leading up to and including his immigration as a refugee to the United States, as well as his recollection of Persian oral histories and family legends. He acknowledges the work to be fiction not because what he has written is false, but because his story is based on his memories alone, rather than being a well-researched and fact-checked biography or memoir.

I chose to read Everything Sad is Untrue because of my obsession with immigrant stories and with learning about the perspectives of cultures different than my own, and because the book's summary promised rich tales of Persian mysteries, interwoven with Nayeri's own experiences, and I could not resist that.

In this review, I will be evaluating point of view, writing style, and symbolism.

One of the most remarkable things about Everything Sad is Untrue is how Nayeri wrote from an authentic teenage perspective. As an adult reading his story, there were many times that I thought to myself 'Khosrou, you were a kid, events X, Y, and Z weren't your fault or your responsibility'. However, that is not the way pre-teens and teenagers see the world. While not wanting to paint youth as all the same, it is true that at these ages, when hormones are imbalanced and brains are not fully developed, it often feels like everything happening is about you. It also often feels like every problem is a crisis, with teens sometimes having difficulty differentiating between the severity of a poor grade and a looming divorce. These are feelings that Nayeri captures perfectly by writing with a first-person point-of-view, from the perspective of his own 12-year-old self. For example, in the novel Nayeri discusses his mother marrying and divorcing his abusive stepfather Ray, then marrying, divorcing, and marrying him again. However, in recalling these events and the instability they created within his life as a refugee in Oklahoma, Nayeri never once examines why his mother married Ray, nor why she kept returning to him. His older sister tells him that his mom is with Ray because she wants Khosrou (the name Nayeri refers to himself with for the bulk of the novel) to have a male role model, and Khosrou accepts this. At 12, he internalizes the guilt of being the reason his mom stays with an abuser and also takes on himself the responsibility of growing strong and tough so that one day he can avenge his mother by beating up Ray. As an adult, the whole thing seems a bit ridiculous. As a teen, I remember feeling responsible every time my mother felt sad, and I remember my grand yet simplistic plans to set the world right once I was old enough to do so. Nayeri/Khosrou is an unreliable narrator in the best way, because he is a completely unguarded and truthful narrator. His feelings are raw. And while the life story he shares within Everything Sad is Untrue may literally be untrue and lacking basis in facts, it is also perfectly true because of how it is based in Khosrou's personal truth.

Toward the end of the book, Nayeri (2020) recounts a teacher criticizing his storytelling, to which he replies that the teacher is 'beholden to a Western mode of storytelling that [he does] not accept" (p. 300). This line sums up another brilliant aspect of Everything Sad is Untrue. Nayari embraces his entire identity within the novel. He is both a Persian storyteller and an American writer. His writing style is accessible to American youth but also uses unfamiliar storytelling devices. Everything Sad is Untrue does not follow a traditional Western plotline, with a conflict, rising action, climax, and falling action. Rather, the conflict is buried in flashbacks from Khosrou's life before he found himself in an American middle school, and these flashbacks are broken up further with the inclusion of Persian and family legends. The storytelling is not linear and can be confusing to readers because it reflects an oral storytelling style that is uncommon in Western literature. However, if the reader makes the effort to ground themselves in Khosrou's world, following his storytelling path is rewarding. And while I personally felt a bit unmoored after finishing the book (because the story novel closes with an anticlimactic climax and no falling action), I cannot stop thinking about the lessons found within Everything Sad is Untrue. The power within Nayeri's storytelling is that it does not depend upon a well-wrapped-up conclusion but instead is made up of a hundred small stories. Each of these stories can stand on their own, but when combined they make a marvelous, if imperfect, whole.

Finally, an important symbol used throughout Everything Sad is Untrue is that of the Persian Rug. Nayeri explains how these rugs are found throughout Iran, and while some are simple and common, used outside a storefront or under a vendor's table, some are so intricate that they become a person or family's most valuable possession, a symbol of their status and wealth. Nayeri explains how all Persian rugs are honored and that even the simplest rug is not to be walked on with one's dirty shoes. He explains how each rug possesses an intentionally missed stitch, a representation of human frailty and a reminder that only God is perfect. And alongside these various and increasingly in-depth explanations, Khosrou tells his stories. Some carry the glory of ancient Persia, some the weight of religious expectation and belief. Some tell of true love, others of lives ruined. Some are so beautiful they make you want to cry, and some are so heart-breaking they make you want to cry. A lot of the stories are about ancestry. A lot are about death. A lot of the stories talk about the blood carried in your heart, whether that is the heritage you carry or the blood you feel responsible for spilling. And, a lot of Khosrou's stories are about poop. But he offers the reader all of them. Glorious or common, they are all worth telling and being heard, they are all imperfect, and they are all 12-year-old Nayeri's (untrue) truth.

Nayeri, D. (2020). Everything sad is untrue (a true story). Levine Querido.