SISTERS by Daisy Johnson

Two sisters, July and September, are close in age but complete opposites in personality; they operate almost like conjoined twins with September clearly in charge.  They flee Oxford with their mother, Sheela, for reasons to be explained later, to their father’s nearly derelict family vacation home.  Gradually we learn the backstory of this family.  July is basically her older sister’s devoted acolyte, playing games in which September requires that July perform acts of vandalism, among other naughty deeds, and September’s demands are the direct cause of July’s self-inflicted wounds.  September may be a cruel tyrant, but she also serves as July’s protector when July becomes a target for bullies and pranksters at school.  Where is their mother in all this?  Sheela basically checks out and leaves the girls to their own devices.  Ironically, despite her lapse in parenting, Sheela writes and illustrates children’s books in which her daughters are the main characters.  She seems aware of their unhealthy relationship but not to the degree that she is willing to do anything about it.  This book has an eerie, spooky feel to it, and the twist, which is extremely obvious, is a long time coming.  I spotted it a mile away, because the author dangles too many clues, and the creepy mood is one of them, along with July’s dreamlike narration in which the facts are a little fuzzy.  The author also foretells the conclusion in an earlier conversation between the two girls.  Even so, I felt that the ending could be interpreted in two ways, particularly given the events at a drunken beach party, but the foreshadowing caused me to lean in one particular direction.