"From the outside, the Chengs seem like poster children for the enduring promise of the American Dream. Once Patty landed a tech job near Dallas, she and Liang grew secure enough to have a second child, and to send for their first from his grandparents back in China. Isn't this what they sacrificed so much for, to be a family? But then little Annabel begins to sleepwalk at night, putting in motion a string of misunderstandings that strips away their façade of suburban normalcy, threatening to set the community against them and turn their dream into tragedy. As the Chengs come undone, they are forced to confront the hidden pain and secret yearnings that have made them fear not only the world outside but one another. How can a man make peace with the terrors of his past? How can a child regain trust in unconditional love? How can a family stop burying its history and forge a way through it, to a more honest intimacy? Set during the early aughts, Nights When Nothing Happened is gripping storytelling immersed in the cross-currents that have reshaped the American landscape, from a prodigious new literary talent"-- Provided by publisher.