The Sullivan Sisters by Kathryn Ormsbee

The Quick Cut: Three sisters find themselves embroiled in long hidden secrets when a relative leaves them everything in his will. A Real Review: Family can be complicated. Whether they mean to or not, siblings can be the most. Having grown up with you, they can know all the ways to irritate you. For the three Sullivan sisters, that ability is about to get highlighted. Murphy, Claire, and Eileen have a less than happy home life. Although these sisters used to be close, they have become more than a little distant in recent years. These sisters are about to interact again though when an uncle they didn't know about leaves them each an equal allotment of what he's left behind. Each one has their own reason for wanting to know more about the why. Will the truth bring them back together? Or farther apart? I got this book as part of a book box for the holidays. It seemed like an interesting premise from the description. However, one thing bugged me the entire time I was reading it: the pace of the story. Although the sisters all have their issues and complications, the drama never really kept my interest because everything happens at a snail's pace. I'm a fast paced reader, which means that this one was a clash of styles. The chapters are narrated by each of the sisters, with each of them having different issues. Murphy, the youngest, had a pet die unexpectedly. The middle one, Claire, got rejected from her dream school Yale. Eileen, the oldest, is on the path to a serious alcohol addiction and is in denial about it. They are all dealing with difficulties in some form and finding themselves isolated in the process. Seeing them pushed together by circumstances and how their individual issues are highlighted by the others makes for some interesting fighting. Still, I didn't feel like their voices as characters were unique enough. I kept forgetting who was supposed to be the narrator of each chapter. A complex sibling relationship that goes quite slow. My rating: 2.75 out of 5