My Sister, the Serial Killer: A Novel

This novel wasn’t what I expected it to be. “My Sister, the Serial Killer” reads like a novel in verse, with short chapters focused on central themes and loosely on a forward trajectory. And while I can’t say I found this novel to be blackly comic, this story did have me feeling a lot of things. On the surface, this is the story of an older “ugly duckling” sister who was always expected to take care of and protect her gorgeous baby sister. At first, from an abusive father, then it became protecting her sister from the consequences of her actions as she cleans up the crimes her sister commits. Korede is always more haunted by what her sister does than Ayoola seems to be, though Ayoola is far better at spotting terrible men and using them for all their financial worth. And all the while, there is a delicious undercurrent of tension and rage building throughout the novel that had me, despite it not being the story I thought it would be, loving it come the end. Not only is the writing and organization of this story lovely—you can definitely tell a poet wrote this book—but I love the way the author builds a slow, simmering rage for Korede and aimed at the people around her, and even herself at times, that boils over come the end of the book. The story makes you question blind loyalty, the things we see on social media, perception, love, and even (or, especially) beauty. Korede is a jealous enabler, and Ayoola is completely self-absorbed; they are both severely flawed and yet Korede always shows up for her sister, at the detriment of her own individuality and happiness. The author does a great job at balancing sympathy and frustration for these sisters to where, even though it’s supposed to be satirical (I guess?) both characters feel very real. While this book didn’t deliver on the things I expected—I was thinking Ayoola would be a traditional serial killer and Korede would fear her and there’d be some mystery/thriller aspects—it left me thinking about this book for days after finishing. “My Sister, the Serial Killer” will leave you wondering about what really happened to these sisters to where this is how they ended up, why Korede would suffer to be her sister’s keeper for the rest of her days, and who’s version of what happened to all these men is real. And while the story itself is fine, what really stole the show for me was Korede’s stoic inner thoughts and the verse like writing, which is why I’m giving this 5 stars. A stunning debut!

For my fourth writing activity I have chosen to read and review "My Sister, the Serial Killer" by Oyinkan Braithwaite. It is a dark comedy crime novel that takes place in Lagos, Nigeria. It is about a young Nigerian nurse named Korede who is close with her younger sister, Ayoola. Ayoola is the favorite child and described as remarkably beautiful by others compared to her more plain sister. Ayoola is also a bit of a sociopath, because when the novel begins she has just stabbed another one of her boyfriends to death. This is the third time Ayoola has killed one of her boyfriends. Korede helps her sister to dispose of these killings and eventually her crush, the handsome doctor Kade starts to date Ayoola. So now she must choose between her family and the man she loves. I chose this book to review because I really like comedies, specifically dark comedies, so when this book was brought up at the beginning of the semester and I found out that we had to do a book review I instantly knew what I was going to review this novel. There are a couple of things that I found very interesting while reading it. The writing style of Braithwaite and the relationship between the sisters. First, I want to talk about the writing style of the author, Oyinkan Braithwaite. This book is a very quick read and the chapters are only a few pages long. While reading this book I found that there was very little to no dead space or filler in the chapters. Everything seemed very fast paced and concise. Take the second chapter of the novel for example. It is titled "The Notebook" and it is only two pages long (I read the book on my Kindle, so it may differ version to version). Heck it took me only an hour and forty two minutes for me to read. I was very confused by this because if I had one kind of gripe with this book it was that I wanted more. More insight into the internal monologue of other characters, specifically Ayoola. At first I thought this was done in contrast to other African stories I read where the writing is very detailed. For example on page fifteen there is the passage "I can smell him from ten feet away, and it is a rank, stale odor". There is no further description of the odor and the passage is just straight to the point. So, I did a bit of research and found out that the author did a lot of poetry before this book. This revolution helped explain her writing style of getting to the main story with little fluff. Poetry is typically short and gets to the main point fairly quickly. Finally, I would like to take a look at the relationship between Korede and Ayoola. Arguably the most important relationship in the whole book. Both siblings do love each other, but from what is presented on the page Korede is much more invested in the relationship. Korede tried to stop their abusive father from punishing Ayoola in the past and has quite literally helped Ayoola get away with murder on four occasions. Ayoola love is more shown with her trying to share her philosophy with Korede which she views as truth. But from what I read the relationship is pretty one sided. Korede is literally helping her sister get away with murder and she is repaying her by dating the guy she likes and getting ready to kill him. Their relationship makes me think back to "Nervous Conditions" and how the family in that didn't uplift each other and kind of brought each other down over competition. Overall, I really enjoyed this book and would highly recommend it to others especially those who like crime novels and have a bit of a dark sense of humor. It is a very quick read that is funny, psychologically thrilling and intense. If I had to score it I would give it a nine out of ten.

This was a quick read. And it isn't hard to keep your attention. How it was written did take a little adjusting to but it didn't make it difficult to read or anything like that. If anything the style it is written with tiny chapters gives almost a Journaling like feel from the MC. Especially since the entire book is from her POV. The tiny chapters will be found convenient if you are multi taking while you read or if you get called away from reading it gives easy, quick stopping points The story I found it interesting enough that it kept my attention and I soaked up the book fast. I did find that throughout it, it was predictable. The ending wasn't really how I expected it, but kt was generally a HEA. This story does deal with murder. Plenty of murder. However, take away, the bigger picture it is about friendship, and loyalty. My rating and why: Price point. I obviously paid for the book so I only hated it so much. However, it is the most I have ever paid for a digital copy of a book and is one of the smaller books I have read. So page per dollar cost I consider it high for what you are getting. Hindsight I likely would have gone paperback as it is cheaper. I purchased this to get the black history month book mark, and decided that I wanted to be something that intrigued me, so my read could be enjoyable. While yes it was short and predictable, I did enjoy it. Which if there was half stars I would give it a 3.5

Finished the book over the weekend. Loved it very much! Very interesting premise, enjoyed the difficult choices our main character is faced with. Love or family? Can she receive the love she is looking for or are all men just the same when confronted with her sister.

The pretty sister gets away with murdering her boyfriends time and time again. How much longer can this go on?

Semplicemente fantastico

This book was fast-paced, at times hilarious, at times, heartbreaking and overall such a joy to read.

This is a funny novel and a short novel, two things that might make it very appealing to someone looking for a light and quick read. However, it has a darker side, and I’m not talking about the murders of (at least) three men. There are darker things than murders in this novel. In fact, it’s refreshing to have a young, attractive woman murdering men rather than the other way around. Did I say attractive? The narrator Korede (the plain sister) makes it clear that her younger sister Ayoola isn’t just attractive, she is sublimely beautiful and men – and women – are putty in her hands. In Half of a Yellow Sun we had the more beautiful sister as narrator, who cheats with her plainer sister’s man. Here the plainer sister is the narrator, doomed to remain an onlooker to her beautiful sister’s exciting life. Ayoola gets lots of bracelets, rings, flowers and trips to Dubai with adoring men. Korede gets lots of lip from her colleagues at the hospital where she works as a nurse. One disquieting feature of Ayoola’s beauty is her light skin and this is one of the things that makes the novel so disquieting. When it comes to female beauty, light skin is good and dark skin is unforgivably bad. Far more disturbing than murder is the way beauty determines a woman’s life, how she is perceived by others and her sense of self-worth. In this novel, insidiously, women aren’t just judged by men but by women as well. Ayoola has always been the mother’s favourite just because she is beautiful. And because Ayoola is beautiful, men brush past Korede in their haste to gaze on and worship her sister. The mother has given up any hope of Korede finding a husband but she has high hopes that Ayoola will catch a real good ‘un. At one hilarious point she serves a suitor a slice of upside down cake and when he says how delicious it is, she hurriedly points out that Ayoola baked it (great wife material). Meanwhile, Korede tells us that Ayoola couldn’t fry an egg and only ever goes in the kitchen to forage for snacks. Another disturbing feature of the novel is the role of patriarchy in squeezing women into a limited set of life chances and behaviours. Looming over Ayoola’s murders and the relationship between the sisters and their mother is the ghost of their long-dead tyrant of a father. In fact, during the novel, at the insistence of their aunt, the two sisters and their mother put on a tenth anniversary memorial service for the old beast. Then we learn that the aunt was involved in a plot by the father to gift the 14 year old Ayoola to some crusty old tribal chieftain in return for a lucrative business deal. However, we are not asked to believe that some childhood trauma can explain or justify Ayoola’s habit of killing her boyfriends. We are given a rather conventional correlation between beauty and narcissism, but this novel takes it further. Ayoola believes that everything will turn out well for her, no matter what she does. She can shape her own history and destiny. Nothing bad can possibly happen to her. And one reason for her optimism is that she knows that big sister has her back. After she’s done the deed, Korede will turn up with rubber gloves and bleach and clean up the mess. Literally. Some readers might find the ending annoying or frustrating. I found it tremendously satisfying. Suffice to say, sisters stick together. I do have one minor gripe about this book: for some mystifying reason it’s written in American. The author has spent part of her life in the UK, including secondary school and university, and has been back in Nigeria since 2012, so I can’t understand why she used US spelling, grammar and vocabulary. My son-in-law is Nigerian. Several members of my family are married to Nigerians and I have many Nigerian friends and colleagues. None of them speaks American. Half of a Yellow Sun is written in American but I can just about forgive that because Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie has been living in the US for years, but Oyinkan Braithwaite has no such excuse. I can only surmise that her American editor persuaded her that sales in the US would benefit.