Reviews with content warning for Murder - How the One-Armed Sister Sweeps Her House

Read as part of the semi finals fiction of the BookTube Prize 2022, ranked 5 out of 6.

In this book, there are a couple of storylines which are intertwined. What binds them together is violence. The story shows how hard it is to escape its claws, if it is even possible. If there's nowhere to go and nobody to turn to - even the police - how would you do it?

You do get a sense of the two versions of the world which are meeting on this island: the tourist version of white beaches and locals who will service them in every way, and the version of the locals which is steeped in violence and poverty. The story focuses on the locals though, with one storyline mingled in that extends to the white/rich people who have gated second homes on the island.

I do find it hard to see how the women warn each other about violence, but don't seem to be able to escape it anyway and even just let it happen to them once it does. Maybe their warnings are not explicit enough. Just telling girls not to go certain places without saying exactly what might happen (happened to themselves) is not a strong enough advice. If you don't see people escaping bad situations in your environment, maybe you start believing it is not possible to get away from it. If nobody talks about their shitty situation or what happened in their past, you think that you're the only one and it's your own fault. As this story takes place on an island, you also get the sense that there is physically nowhere to go as you can never run very far unless you leave the island.

The ending is very open. We don't know what happened to Mira. We don't know, but we get a hint about, what happened to Lala. We don't know what is going to happen to Tone. The story can still end in a couple of ways. Given the story that preceded, I imagine it won't be the happiest option for any of them.

The writing is all right but not exceptional. The horrible events in the book are described in a quite detached way - as if the author doesn't really want to or can't dive into them. So it is left to the reader to imagine what happens. For the reader who has never really been through anything bad, the book doesn't really hit home. For the reader who has - this might be a hard story to read.

I do recognize I'm not in a position to know how accurate this book is to the situation on Barbados and to the experiences of people who have been victims of this type of violence - people who know indicate it is accurate - and that I'm privileged in the sense that I'm able to close off to this topic by choosing not to engage.

Content Warnings

hannasnowmueller's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

Content Warnings

camdelo96's review against another edition

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dark sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

3.0

Content Warnings

filawless's review

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challenging dark emotional tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

Could not put this book down. A book that explores the dynamics of three marriages in Barbados. Major trigger warnings for domestic abuse, death, murder but a book that is so well written it will stay with me for a long time.

Content Warnings