July: Reading Sibling Stories
3 recent fiction titles + 1 memoir with sibling relationships at the heart
Dear Readers,
Have you noticed that summer book releases tend to be centered on family relationships, when they’re not about romance? Makes sense to me. My ideal of summer involves days full of family togetherness if not much else. While the ideal does not always match reality, it just feels right to read about families in the summer.
When I looked at my most anticipated books of summer, I realized a common theme of siblings as the main characters. And since reading Pulitzer-winner Liliana’s Invincible Summer last month, I’ve been thinking alot about the complexity and depth of these relationships. The dynamics of being part of a group of peers none of the members had any choice in forming—and the ways what happens to a sibling shapes one’s own view of what’s possible in life—provide rich material to explore conflict, character, and feelings.
It’s already July 7 so I’m keeping this month’s themed list to just four titles. Which of them looks most intriguing to you? If you’ve already read any of them, share your thoughts in the comments.
Bear
Julia Phillips
Hogarth
June 25, 2024 | 304 pages
Psychological, Women, Siblings, Literary
By 2024 Guggenheim fellow Julia Phillips, whose debut novel Disappearing Earth was nominated for a National Book Award, Bear is a modern fairy tale taking place on an island off the coast of Washington state. Sisters Sam and Elena’s struggle to survive on wages from working class jobs serving the wealthy mainlanders who maintain homes there leads them to plan their escape from the only home they’ve known. But when a bear Sam spotted swimming the channel turns up at their home, the sisters each interpret it as a message about what they should do next and arrive at different conclusions. Everyone’s talking about the ending of this book, so if you want to read it I’d advise jumping straight in— do not pass any bookish podcast episodes, do not collect $200.
The Friday Afternoon Club: A Family Memoir
Griffin Dunne
Penguin Press
June 11, 2024 | 400 pages
Entertainment & Performing Arts, Literary Figures, Memoir
Here we have a celebrity memoir dripping with Hollywood and literary Manhattan sparkle of the 1970s and 1980s: Joan Didion, Tom Wolfe, Janis Joplin, Carrie Fisher, and the list goes on. And in the midst of it all, Dunne’s twenty-two-year-old sister, Dominque Dunne’s, ex-boyfriend strangled her in 1982, leading to one of the most public trials of the 1980s and a travesty of justice. His father, producer Dominick Dunne, chronicled the experience of the trial for Vanity Fair and subsequently launched his career as the magazine’s crime reporter covering the most notorious trials of the end of the last century. In this memoir, Dunne reveals his father’s deathbed secret— a multi-decade affair with one of Dominque’s closest friends, a key witness in her trial.
Greta & Valdin
Rebecca K. Reilly
Avid Reader Press/Simon & Schuster
Feb 6, 2024 | 352 pages
LGBT, Literary Family Life, Siblings
New York Times Editors’ Choice. This international bestseller by New Zealand novelist Rebecca K. Reilly is told in alternating first person chapters from the point of view of queer siblings and roommates, Greta and Valdin Valdisavljevic. They’re in their mid-20s, trying to figure out their goals and livelihoods, relate through neurodivergence, and find romance. In the Maori-Russian Valdisavljevic family, queerness is common— Valdin’s ex-boyfriend is also his uncle’s husband’s brother— and they’re “a bunch of strange, romantic, emotional people,” as their father Linsch says. Listening to the siblinga as they narrate their online-influenced daily lives feels a bit like reading a fluffy summer romance, giving into a long session of swiping on TikTok, and watching a favorite sit-com all at once. Very unique.
Promise
Rachel Eliza Griffiths
Random House
July 11, 2023 | 336 pages
Literary—Family Life, African-American, Historical
A Kirkus Review Best Book of the Year, nominated for PEN America’s Hemingway Award for Debut Novel. It’s the end of summer 1957. Sisters Ezra and Cinthy Kindred’s life in the village of Salt Point on the coastal bluffs of Maine has been filled with love— from their parents and the close relationship the family has with another Black family, the Junketts. As news from around the country calls for justice and equity for Black Americans, their white neighbors, including Ezra’s best friend Ruby, begin to see the Kindreds and the Junketts as a threat to their way of life, the girls discover that “To claim herself was the sweetest and most dangerous theft.”
Share your favorites
What are some of your favorite sibling stories? Please add to this list in the comments!
Want to talk with me about any of the books on July’s list? It’s about time for another a Book Talk, so just reach out and let me know you’re interested.
National Book Foundation Summer Reading Adventure
Remember those summer reading challenges from the old days? I’m working through a fun one in honor of the National Book Foundation’s 75th anniversary. Take the challenge with us, and post your progress on our Friday threads.
Just popping on to recommend My Sister, the Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite. I read it a few years ago and found it to be a totally unique take on the sibling relationship trope.
These all look pretty good tbf! Particularly 'Greta and Valdin, which I haven't come across, and of course the Dunne one- I'm obsessed by Joan Didion and the circles she moved in :)