THE OBVIOUS choice of sister fiction is Little Women by Louisa May Alcott, the standard about sisters Meg, Jo, Amy, and Beth March’s daily experiences as young women in the late nineteenth century. Also predictable, but more up to date: Think Rebecca Wells’s Divine Secrets of the Ya Ya Sisterhood, perhaps, or The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, the four-book young-adult series by Ann Brashares. At TSP, though, we sisters hate to be simply obvious. Here are some of our staff picks:
FROM ANASTASIA SMITH OF ‘CLAIMING SISTERHOOD’
•BEEZUS AND RAMONA, by BEVERLY CLEARY As a part of a series about the commonly misunderstood antics of Ramona Quimby, this young-adult novel portrays the comic (and constant) ruckus that 4-year-old Ramona causes in her older sister’s life.
•HOW THE GARCIA GIRLS LOST THEIR ACCENTS, by JULIA ALVAREZ The four Garcia girls (Carla, Sandra, Yolanda, and Sofia) live a privileged and protected life in the Dominican Republic until their family is forced out by a dictator’s military police. They relocate to New York, where the sisters must straddle cultural lines and learn to speak English without a trace of their Spanish accent.
•from ST. LUCY’S HOME FOR GIRLS RAISED BY WOLVES, by KAREN RUSSELL In the story “Ava Wrestles the Alligator,” Ava tries to save her older sister, Ossie, from the grasp of a phantom lover while the two girls are left alone on their family’s alligator farm. It is a story of addiction, isolation, and the power of language.
•THE VIRGIN SUICIDES, by JEFFREY EUGENIDES Told from the perspective of curious neighborhood boys, The Virgin Suicides is the story of the five elusive Lisbon sisters (Cecila, Lux, Bonnie, Mary, and Therese) who are hidden away from the world by their overprotective Catholic parents.
•from REASONS TO LIVE, by AMY HEMPEL In “In the Cemetery Where Al Jolson is Buried,” Hempel renders an incredible image of the human struggle to reconcile with the death through the eyes of a woman visiting her best friend in the hospital.
•THE NAMESAKE, by JHUMPA LAHIRI Lahiri tells the life of Gogol (a first generation American from Indian parents), as he struggles to navigate identity through many conflicting roles.
•TIS PITY SHE’S A WHORE, by JOHN FORD You will never succeed at finding another story where twins have an incestuous love affair, and in a jealous rage the brother cuts out his sister’s heart and brings it to her wedding feast on a sword. Not bad for 17th century fiction.
•THE HANDMAID’S TALE, by MARGARET ATWOOD In this dystopian novel about female subjugation, women are reduced to chattel. Yet the women in Handmaid’s Tale hold a certain power over their oppressors through their solidarity. Written in 1985, this novel is a stinging social critique of a culture’s backlash against feminism.
FROM MARION ROACH SMITH OF ‘SHE SAID, SHE SAID’
Marion’s Classics
•ANTIGONE, by SOPHOCLES The original Pride and Prejudice.
•KING LEAR, by WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE The best argument on why never to divide property among offspring.
•SENSE AND SENSIBILITY, by JANE AUSTEN Sisters who grow together stay together.
•PRIDE AND PREJUDICE, by JANE AUSTEN Ditto.
•MANSFIELD PARK, by JANE AUSTEN How one three-way sister spat plays out in the lives of so many.
•HOWARDS END, by E.M. FORSTER A great study of separate sister politics and yet total sister loyalty.
•LITTLE WOMEN, by LOUISA MAY ALCOTT Sibling love above all else is a fine, if rare, thing.
•BUNNER SISTERS, by EDITH WHARTON Ah, Edith. Who does the dashed hopes of women better than Edith Wharton? And in this case, you get a double dose in the sisters so eloquently portrayed in her short novel.
Marion’s Contemporary Picks
•TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD, by HARPER LEE Ah, Scout. Where is there a better little sister?
•MEMBER OF THE WEDDING, by CARSON MCCULLERS Best story/play on growing out of being merely a little sister.
•HOUSEKEEPING, by MARILYNNE ROBINSON Best debut novel on sisters. Period.
•THE VIRGIN SUICIDES, by JEFFREY EUGENIDES Five sisters from the Greek-chorus POV of teenage boys.
•THE PRINCE OF TIDES, by PAT CONROY The brother/sister bond amid what reads like perhaps America’s most dysfunctional family.
FROM PAIGE SMITH ORLOFF OF ‘HEY, LITTLE SISTER’
•CAT’S EYE, by MARGARET ATWOOD The best book ever written about the delicacy and pain of female friendship.
•MADELINE IS SLEEPING, by SARAH SHUN-LIEN BYNUM A surreal story of a young French girl’s adventures in dreamland.
•NICE TO COME HOME TO, by REBECCA FLOWERS When the men in your life disappoint, your sister will carry you. A modern re-telling of Pride and Prejudice set in Washington, DC.
•THE JOY LUCK CLUB, by AMY TAN Four Chinese-born mothers, their American-born daughters, and a journey back to China to find one family’s long-lost half-sisters.
•CASSANDRA AT THE WEDDING, by DOROTHY BAKER A twin heads home for her sister’s wedding, determined to stop it.
•THE SISTERS GRIMM (a series), by MICHAEL BUCKLEY AND PETER FERGUSON The adventures of sisters Daphne and Sabrina Grimm. After the deaths of their parents, the girls are sent to live with a mysterious grandmother they never knew existed. Their new hometown, Ferryport Landing, is populated by the “Everafters,” characters straight from fairy tales, and full of mysteries the girls must help to solve. Recommended for sisters of all ages.
•I SEE YOU EVERYWHERE, by JULIA GLASS Two sisters struggle with envy and jealousy even as they are strongly bound to each other. From the National Book Award-winning author of The Three Junes.
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As my sister lay unconscious and awaiting death, I sat at her bedside reading to her The Seven Sisters by Margaret Drabble. I don’t remember much about the book itself, and I don’t know if she heard me reading any of it (the hearing is the last to shut down) but the experience of sharing a book together for the last time gave the book great meaning to me forever. She died 10 minutes after I read the last sentence of the book, “Stretch forth your hand,, I say, stretch forth your hand.” Such bittersweet memories…
Dear Priscilla: Such a gorgeous tale. So vivid and, of course, so extraordinary, that you were reading to your sister about sisters as she left this life. Later this week, in one of my regular memoir posts on my blog, She Said, She Said, I’m going to talk about when sisters die. Please come along and read and share. Thank you for being here.
I think my new favorite Margaret Atwood book is definitely The Blind Assassin, which – besides being a book about sisters – weaves three different-though-related stories together.
Welcome, Danielle…we are ordering it on your recommendation, thanks. Hope to see you soon again.
I am re-reading The Color Purple. What a beautiful sister book.
Welcome, Laela. Definitely one to remember, thank you. Hope to see you soon again with more good picks for the list.