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A review by patricia_baker
Blue Sisters by Coco Mellors
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
I read many reviews of this book that I just did not agree with. It has been described as a book on grief and loss, or addiction and death. I think it is ultimately a book about survival and the power of love to guide you through it. It is about exceptional and complicated people who make mistakes, but who ultimately learn to trust in each other and themselves.
"A sister is not a friend. Who can explain the urge to take a relationship as primal and complex as a sibling and reduce it to something as replaceable, as banal as a friend?"
"Most people go through life never knowing what it’s like to have a calling, one that asks you to sacrifice the pleasure of the moment for the potential of a dream that may not be realized for years, if at all. It sets you apart from others, whether you want it to or not. It can be grueling, lonely, and punishing, but, if it is really your calling, it is not a choice."
"Avery had previously thought love was built on large, visible gestures, but a marriage turned out to be the accrual of ordinary, almost inconsequential, acts of daily devotion—washing the mugs left in the sink before bed, taking the time to run up or downstairs to kiss each other quickly before one left the house, cutting up an extra piece of fruit to share—acts easy to miss, but if ever gone, deeply missed."
"That was family, she thought sadly, the root of all comfort and chaos."
"A sister is not a friend. Who can explain the urge to take a relationship as primal and complex as a sibling and reduce it to something as replaceable, as banal as a friend?"
"Most people go through life never knowing what it’s like to have a calling, one that asks you to sacrifice the pleasure of the moment for the potential of a dream that may not be realized for years, if at all. It sets you apart from others, whether you want it to or not. It can be grueling, lonely, and punishing, but, if it is really your calling, it is not a choice."
"Avery had previously thought love was built on large, visible gestures, but a marriage turned out to be the accrual of ordinary, almost inconsequential, acts of daily devotion—washing the mugs left in the sink before bed, taking the time to run up or downstairs to kiss each other quickly before one left the house, cutting up an extra piece of fruit to share—acts easy to miss, but if ever gone, deeply missed."
"That was family, she thought sadly, the root of all comfort and chaos."
Content Warnings
Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Death, and Alcohol