Sister Of Mine by Laurie Petrou | @lauriepetrou @noexitpress | #blogtour #RandomThingsTours

Welcome to my stop on the blog tour for Sister of Mine by Laurie Petrou! My thanks to Anne Cater at Random Things Tours for the invitation to join and to the publisher for my review copy!

Author : Laurie Petrou
Title : Sister of Mine
Pages : 250
Publisher : No Exit Press
Publication date : June 20, 2019

| ABOUT THE BOOK |

Penny and Hattie are sisters in a small town, bound tight to the point of knots. They share a secret they cannot escape, even while it pulls them apart. 

One night, a match is lit, and Penny’s terrible husband is killed – a marriage going up in flames, and offering the potential of a new life. The sisters retreat into their family home – a house of secrets and memories – and try to live in the shadow of what they put in motion. But Penny’s husband is not the only thing they are hiding, from the outside world and from each other.

Under a cloud of long-held resentments, sibling rivalry, and debts unpaid, the bonds of sisterhood begin to crack. How long will Penny and Hattie demand the unthinkable of each other? How often will they say, “You owe me,” and when will it ever be enough? 

| MY THOUGHTS |

There is always something quite fascinating about the relationship between sisters, for some reason. However, the relationship between Penny and Hattie is a tad on the dysfunctional side.

The two sisters have always found themselves on the outside of the small community where they’ve lived their entire lives. As a teenager, Hattie makes a break for freedom but young love and the lure of her hometown soon bring her back home. After Hattie’s husband dies in a fire, the sisters retreat to their family home and try to live with a massive secret. Sibling rivalry is a dangerous thing, however, and cracks start to appear in their relationship.

Sister of Mine makes for some compulsive reading. While relatively on the slow side, I found myself glued to the pages; wondering what would happen, all the while feeling it couldn’t be anything good. These two characters don’t exactly come across as particularly likeable. Is one a good sister and the other a bad one? Are they both bad? I had a heck of a time trying to decide. Yet, having a younger sister of my own, there were some moments I could absolutely relate to.

There’s a rather great sense of claustrophobia throughout this novel. It’s not only brought on by the small town feeling, where everybody seems to know your business, and no matter how hard you try there doesn’t seem to be any escape. It’s also in the relationship between the sisters themselves. This secret they both keep is an explosive one. One that could change their lives if it ever came out. If you’re not entirely sure the other person will keep their mouth shut, there’s little you can do but constantly keep an eye on them, ultimately putting your own life on hold.

Sister of Mine is a tense and character-driven psychological thriller that really brings to the fore how thin the line between love and hate can be. There are no dazzling twists or shocking surprises but there didn’t need to be. This dark story is all about the complex characters and how far they will go to test the bond between them and this gripping tale of sisterhood will undoubtedly appeal to fans of the domestic family genre.

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| ABOUT THE AUTHOR |

Author, Professor, PhD, drinker of tea.

Most of my adventures take place inside books. I am, I think, part Hobbit: I love my books, my armchair, my garden… but I am not at all stealth (was once described as a Clydesdale for the way I clomp around the house).

 My 2nd book, Sister of Mine, won the inaugural Half the World Award, and was on a number of Best Of lists, including the Top 100 Books of 2018 of the Globe and Mail (2nd time running).