The Things We Never Say is a 2026 literary novel by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Elizabeth Strout that explores profound human isolation, unspoken grief, and the weight of hidden secrets within a 30-year marriage. The setting of the novel is a coastal town in Massachusetts during the tense backdrop of the 2024 US presidential election.
The protagonist is Artie Dam, a well-respected 57-year-old high school history teacher married to Evie, a family therapist. The conflict in the novel is that despite a comfortable life, Artie suffers from deep internal isolation, societal and political anxiety, and unresolved family trauma tied to an old car crash involving their son, Rob.
The Burden of Isolation
Strout writes prolifically about Artie’s suicidal ideation. Burdened by loneliness and a distant emotional dynamic with his wife—who compartmentalised her trauma after family hardships—Artie secretly plans to end his life by making it look like a tragic sailing accident. Instead, he almost drowns, and this turns around his life. When he stages the event on Massachusetts Bay, an accidental slip causes him to actually begin drowning. In that terrifying moment, his mind rebels, and he realises he desperately wants to live. He is rescued, shifting his perspective on existence. He makes friends with the man who rescues him, and he becomes his secret-keeper. Soon he learns a lifelong secret which breaks his heart.
Title: The Things We Never Say
Author: Elizabeth Strout
Publisher: Random House, 2026
Following the rescue, a family revelation emerges through a deathbed letter: Artie learns from his son Rob that Evie had an affair 28 years prior, and Artie is not Rob’s biological father. Artie doesn’t confront his wife with the secret and carries on with his marriage as before, with the heavy burden of the secret.
Strout has written a brilliant novel about love, life, parenthood, politics, lies, suicide, and what it means to be alive
Artie grapples silently with this massive betrayal while trying to forge a deeper, authentic bond with Rob. Worn down by cumulative emotional and physical strain, Artie eventually suffers a breakdown, retires from teaching, and passes away from a heart attack, leaving Evie to discover the truth and live in isolation. After his death, Evie finds out that Artie knew about the affair and didn’t bother her with it; she never remarries and refers to her husband as an ‘angel’.
The major themes of the book are ‘communication barriers’ between Artie and his wife, and the book shows us the dangers of these barriers. The book explores the dangers of keeping emotional truths bottled up, echoing Carl Jung's notion that true loneliness stems from an inability to share what matters most.
The book explores external versus internal realities: the stark contrast between a seemingly peaceful, functional life and the silent despair hidden underneath. Also, the book discusses political and social anxiety, and how modern polarisation and post-pandemic societal shifts bleed into individual mental health and daily interactions.
A World of Unspoken Truths
The following quote from the book encompasses Artie in a nutshell:
“An unexpected fury rose within Artie, and he stood up from his desk and said, “I just now saw that one of you thought you were better than someone else in this class.” He did not look at Danny Marino or at Rhonda Lazarre. Artie could feel his face getting red, his face was hot—hot!—and he said, “Do not ever feel that you are superior to someone else. Because you are not.” He sat down. He held out his finger to the whole class and shook it. “No one is superior to anyone else in this world.”
Everything, Artie sat forward as he realized this, everything in the world seemed to him to be filled with unspoken truths. Evelyn Peabody trying to kill herself. Artie himself having thought about such a thing for those few months. All the things in the world that people did not know about one another. Even those very close to them.”
The book is a deep analysis of what a secret does to a couple’s marriage and how an affair from years ago can break up a family even as they are living side by side. Although Artie manages to have a wonderful relationship with his son Rob, his relationship with his wife, Evie, suffers, and his performance at school suffers. The book shows how a secret can deteriorate the life of one individual. It also explores the political situation of the time and explains how it has worsened for liberal individuals such as Artie. Strout has written a brilliant novel about love, life, parenthood, politics, lies, suicide, and what it means to be alive. There are just so many things we don’t say aloud as adults, and this novel is all about them. It made me think that we should be more honest in our adult interactions and communication. I loved reading it and would recommend it to all bookworms.