Thank you PRH Audio for the ALC and Berkley #partner, for the finished copy of Blood Sisters in exchange for my honest review.
Publisher: Berkley / Random House Audio
Published: October 31, 2023
Summary:
A visceral and compelling mystery about a Cherokee archeologist for the Bureau of Indian Affairs who is summoned to rural Oklahoma to investigate the disappearance of two women…one of them her sister.
There are secrets in the land.
As an archeologist for the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Syd Walker spends her days in Rhode Island trying to protect the land’s indigenous past, even as she’s escaping her own.
While Syd is dedicated to her job, she’s haunted by a night of violence she barely escaped in her Oklahoma hometown fifteen years ago. Though she swore she’d never go back, the past comes calling.
When a skull is found near the crime scene of her youth, just as her sister, Emma Lou, vanishes, Syd knows she must return home. She refuses to let her sister’s disappearance, or the remains, go ignored—as so often happens in cases of missing Native women.
But not everyone is glad to have Syd home, and she can feel the crosshairs on her back. Still, the deeper Syd digs, the more she uncovers about a string of missing indigenous women cases going back decades. To save her sister, she must expose a darkness in the town that no one wants to face—not even Syd.
The truth will be unearthed.
My thoughts:
I have been a fan of Vanessa Lillie since her debut novel, Little Voices, and have read everything she has written since. This new book is one of my most anticipated books this month and I’m so happy to say it did not disappoint!
This book is both horrifying and enlightening at the same time. It’s an extremely personal story for Vanessa and I love that she was willing to share it with us – she is from Oklahoma, where the story takes place, and to me, her writing about this makes it so much more authentic. I’ve read books that touch on Indigenous people before and the unjust treatment they have suffered but hearing it from someone who has a personal connection to it just makes it that much more powerful. It’s hard not to have strong feelings throughout this book, to feel angry and frustrated and even sad at the way things happen.
I loved the way this story is full of background while also being an engaging thriller. I was completely captivated by the missing women, wanting to find closure for them. But there is so much more that is explored here – how the Indigenous people are forever dealing with loss of land, their homes and businesses, drugs, and even poverty.
If you like police-procedurals and stories based on real life events, this is not to be missed. I went down the rabbit hole of research after finishing this one and know that I won’t be forgetting this story anytime soon.
Audio thoughts:
This was a great story to listen to on audio. There were two narrators, Carolina Hoyos and Erin Tripp, and they did an amazing job bringing the story to life.
