Published by Headline
Release Date 8th March 2018
From the Cover:
MY NAME IS IRINI MY SISTER IS ELLE
OUR PARENTS SENT ME AWAY THEY KEPT HER.
Families should stay together.
What happened that day ripped mine apart.
A successful doctor, with a loving boyfriend, Irini Harringford is finally happy. But when Elle tracks her down, everything starts to unravel.
Irini knows only too well what her sister is capable of. However, her desperate need for answers drags her back to a shocking past.
She always thought her family didn’t want her.
What if the truth is even worse?
Welcome to my stop on the My Sister Blog Tour by Michelle Adams and on release day as well! What a treat this book is. Now I enjoy a psychological thriller but within this genre I value a strong and comprehensive plot, great characters and a satisfying conclusion and I am delighted to be able to say this book has them all.
Told exclusively from the perspective of Irini, on the surface a successful Doctor, steady relationship, financially secure, but as we get to know her we see she is flawed, a product of her childhood, of being given away, to be looked after by an Aunt where she didn’t belong and never knowing why. And this ‘not knowing’ is like an invisible string, tying Irini to Elle the sister that was kept.
The story begins with a phone call from Elle to Irini telling her their mother has died. Irini has spent many years ‘hiding’ from her sister, but whenever she is found she is always drawn in until she escapes again and until the next time. A truly toxic but strangely enmeshed relationship between these two women, with their backstory being told alongside the main plot. Irini looks back on her previous contact with Elle as the reader learns what a damaged character Elle is.
The characterisation in this book was strong, I empathised with Irini’s flaws and faults and fully understood her needing to understand why she was not only given away at a young age but largely estranged from her parents and sister. On the surface Elle appears to like her sister, to have her back and to want to be part of her life, but there are complex emotions at play for both women as well as the reasons that drove this family apart so long ago.
Its safe to say I loved this book, twisted families, secrets and lies what more could you want. The ending was terrific, not all aspects of it surprising but incredibly creepy none the less, it’s unusual for me to feel this level of tension while reading so all credit to the author for achieving this!
Highly recommended by me. Special Thanks to Phoebe Swinburn at Headline Publishing for organising this blog tour, allowing me to be part of it and providing me with a copy of the book.
Check out the rest of the Blog Tour here –
