The Secrets Sisters Keep by Sinéad Moriarty (UK edition)

Title: The Secrets Sisters Keep
Author: Sinéad Moriarty
Genre: Contemporary, Chick Lit
Publisher: Penguin Random House UK (26th February 2015)
Source: Catherine Ryan Howard/Penguin Books
Blurb:

The Devlin sisters rely on each other – but some things are just too painful to share, even when your sisters are your best friends . . .

Mum-of-four Julie thought that if her family had more money, life would be easier. But now they’ve inherited a fortune, her problems are only starting.

Lawyer Louise is used to having life go exactly as she wants it to. Discovering that there are some things even she can’t control is a shock she might never recover from.

And former model Sophie can just about cope with getting older – that’s until her ex-husband finds a younger model.

All three sisters think that some battles can only be fought alone. Maybe they need to think again . . .

Rating: **** (4 stars)
Review:

THE SECRETS SISTERS KEEP is the latest novel from Sinéad Moriarty. The book follows the story of three forty-something sisters – Julie, Louise, and Sophie – as they navigate through the changes in their lives. Julie’s husband recently inherited a fortune which has eased things for her family financially, but means she’s left on her own more. Louise finds out something that changes her life. Whilst Sophie struggles to find her place.

Sometimes you come across books that leave you with a smile, and THE SECRETS SISTERS KEEP was one such book for me. Although I am younger than the protagonists, and don’t have a family of my own yet, I found the stories in the book compelling and relatable. Moriarty manages to capture that feeling of change we all experience at different points in our lives, and make the sisters different experiences relatable. I also really enjoyed the way that Moriarty wrote the different relationships in the book, especially between the three sisters, their parents, and their much younger brother.

For just three hundred and eighty-one pages (in my copy) Moriarty manages to sneak a lot of plot in but I never felt overwhelmed, and by the final page I felt that the sisters’ stories had been resolved. My only slight niggle was I would have loved to see some snapshots of the sisters and their families working together for Louise’s project rather than just seeing the results. Having said that, I really enjoyed following each of the sisters’ character arcs and I didn’t feel the need to have more of this world.

I liked that the narrative of the book was split by chapters, allowing each sister their own platform – so as the reader we could slip into their very different worlds. Moriarty handled the narrative brilliantly, and I loved the fact that she never re-hashed the same scene from a different sister’s point of view – we just saw the aftermath of the events. Having the sisters narrate different chapters gave a real insight into them both individual and as a family. It was really nice that despite having families of their own, their siblings and parents still played an important part in their lives – they still meet up regularly for family meals, as well as in smaller groups.

If you are looking for some contemporary fiction to read, then you might want to consider giving this book a go. THE SECRETS SISTERS KEEP is a nice family story, and it deals with issues we all worry about whether we’re in our twenties or our forties.