A review by eileen_daly_boas
When We Were Sisters by Fatimah Asghar

3.0

There is a lot to like about this novel, but there are some author choices that didn't resonate with me. It's a hard story, and because it's mostly told from the youngest daughter's perspective, there are a lot of questions that don't get answered. There's a lot of abuse, so if you're not in a good headspace, this will be a hard read. I liked that it centered a Muslim family, and that the LGBTQ+ elements aren't tacked on as an afterthought, although I think it could have been more integral than it was.
There's a distance in the storytelling that didn't work for me, it almost reads as a series of vignettes that were later stitched together into a novel - this might be purposeful - that children living through abandonment, abuse and fear experience the world that way, but it's not obviously so.