One for the Books: Such devoted sisters

A song from the movie “White Christmas” is running through my head: “Sisters, sisters, there were never such devoted sisters.” Well, some of these fictional siblings are devoted to each other; some, not so much.

“The Griffin Sisters’ Greatest Hits” is the latest novel by the popular and prolific Jennifer Weiner.

Cassie and older sister Zoe became mega-famous 20 years ago as the singing Griffin Sisters. But something awful happened back then; they broke up and haven’t even spoken to each other since. Now Zoe’s ambitious teenage daughter Cherry wants to be a professional singer. She’s advancing to the semifinals on a TV talent show and needs a mentor. As she’s just learned that she has a famous and talented aunt, she wants to find Aunt Cassie and get her to act as mentor for the TV show.

Cassie has gone clear across the continent to get away from the past, and she doesn’t want to be found. “Cassie had done her best to make a life where she saw, and spoke to, as few people as possible. … She’d thought about killing herself. She’d wanted to die.” She blames herself for what happened and feels “she’d hurt everyone who’d gotten close to her.”

One sister is pretty and thin, the other constantly described as not those things. Cassie is noted to be “clumsy” and “ungainly,” plus size, “unlovely and unlovable”; “She was fat, she was ugly, … Nobody was every going to like her. She would never have a friend.” Whoa! Stop all this negativity. No wonder she’s depressed; it’s depressing me!

The reader becomes embroiled in sibling rivalry and sisterly loyalty. There’s a love story, but it isn’t a romance novel. The story is told from multiple points of view with flashbacks to the early 2000s. The book kept my interest, but I didn’t really engage with any of the characters. It’s VERY pop-music-oriented. If you enjoyed “Daisy Jones and the Six” and the music of the time period, you’ll find plenty to like.

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If you prefer a little sci-fi, “The Beauty of the End” by Laura Stienstra is an unusual story, set in the near future.

First, someone noticed that cicadas never emerged as they were supposed to. Then, it became obvious that there were fewer dogs. And now it’s clear that human birth rates are dropping fast. It seems that “Eventual, irreversible infertility had been written into the cicadas’ genetic code.” Now, scientists have discovered that all forms of life have an expiration programmed into their DNA. “Not much had changed. No one was dying.” But “humanity sat on the threshold of extinction’s door.”

Through new genetic screening, the government can tell how many generations of offspring a person may have. “The average American family would last just four more generations.” To counteract the population decline, the government offers money for women to have more kids. With such an offer, greed and fraud will abound.

Identical twin sisters Maggie and Charlie (the narrator) decide to dedicate their careers to combating this scourge, called the Limit. “Breaking the Limit pretty much amounted to a species-wide search for the biological fountain of youth.” Both women go into genetic counseling. “All of this buys our species more time and better odds,” says Charlie. One sister is a brilliant success until suddenly everything gets very messy.

With themes of medical ethics, governmental control, and familial relationships, the story is just a bit like “The Handmaid’s Tale” in mood.

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Now for some historical fiction: “The Secret Book of Flora Lea” by Patti Callahan Henry. I LOVED this book.

In 1939, the Blitz hits London. The British government decides to implement Operation Pied Piper, to evacuate children out of the city into the countryside for safety. Flora, 6, and her sister Hazel, 14, are sent to Oxfordshire, to stay for the duration with a wonderful woman and her son in an idyllic cottage near the Thames River. To comfort her sister, Hazel tells Flora stories she makes up about a magical place she calls Whisperwood. One day little Flora disappears, having apparently fallen into the river.

Fast forward to 1960. Adult Hazel works at a rare-books shop. While checking out the newest acquisitions, she finds a book with her story about Whisperwood. “Hazel’s breath puddled in her chest. She suddenly felt dizzy, untethered. Goose bumps prickled the back of her neck.” How could this be? “It wasn’t possible. … Whisperwood belonged to her and her lost sister, Flora. It was a private realm that had sprung to life between them, a make-believe world to endure through the worst of the war, a place to find comfort where little existed. And it had disappeared with Flora into the river.” The only person Hazel ever told was her sister. Could she be alive? Or did she tell someone else the story?

Several layers of truths are revealed. We go from believing Flora drowned to believing she’s alive to believing she drowned, back and forth. The book had me crying at the end. I couldn’t put it down. I loved the characters, the setting, the unfolding mystery. It’s a beautiful story and a lovely reading experience. I don’t want to tell you more. Be surprised. But it’s my kind of book, absolutely!

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For a lighter story, here’s a kind of contemporary comic mystery: “Drop Dead Sisters” by Amelia Diane Coombs.

Our narrator is Remi, age 29, a workaholic loner who’s contemplating a new job offer. She’s one of the three Finch sisters, who don’t get along. Remi tells us, “If you have an older sister, there’s a good chance that she’s almost killed you at least once since childhood. Maybe not intentionally — or hey, maybe it was.” The estranged sisters join their “hippie” parents at a state park campground to celebrate their parents’ 40th wedding anniversary.

An obnoxious visitor to their campsite has an accident and winds up dead. It looks like he was murdered, and there’s a good chance they could be implicated in the crime. Remi says, “I’m pretty sure we didn’t kill him, but I’m also not sure that we DIDN’T kill him.” Was it really murder? If so, who did it? And who moved his body?

It’s a quick, fun read. Adult language and situations. A second Finch Sisters book is due out in the fall.

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Happy reading!