Everybody Says It’s Everything Book Review

Everybody Says It’s Everything

A Novel

By: Xhenet Aliu

Publish Date: March 18, 2025

Publisher: Random House Publishing Group-Random House/Random House

General Fiction

#EverybodySaysItsEverything#NetGalley

I would like to thank both NetGalley and Random House for allowing me to read and review this book.

Good Reads Synopsis:

Twins growing up in America in 1999 unravel larger truths about identity and sibling bonds when one gets wrapped up in the war in Kosovo.

Growing up 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. Though inseparable in childhood, their paths diverged as teenagers; Drita was a good girl with and good manners who was going to go to 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 and Drita has abandoned her graduate studies to move home and take care of their mother, giving up her dreams for the future. She hasn’t heard from her brother in three years when Pete’s girlfriend and their son show up unexpectedly without him and in need of help. Realizing that his child may offer the siblings a second chance at being family, Drita becomes determined to find Pete. But what she ends up discovering—both about their connection to their Albanian roots, the war in Kosovo, and the story of their adoption—will surprise everyone, and will either be the thing that brings them together or tears them apart for good.

Book Review:

This is going to be one of the hardest reviews I have to do. I gave this book 2.5 stars and on Good Reads I rounded it down to 2 stars. I so wanted to love this book, but I just had a time trying to understand where the author was going with book. There were important things that the author talked about, but it was lost with the family issues. There was so much going with the family and the lies that each character was telling it was hard to keep track of who did or said what. The Kosovo war is started to be mentioned only around the 50% point. Spoiler here nothing gets resolved in the book and that is disappointing. Also, the chapters are long. The one good thing I liked is the writing style so I will be willing to try another book by this author.