The Murderer's Daughter by Randy Susan Meyers

This novel was amazing! I read it in just over a few days and it was a welcome distraction from the craziness of the beginning of the school year.  It was not what I would call a "feel good" novel by any means, but I think that is why I liked it.  I like books that have a tied up ending but it doesn't necessarily need to be a happy one...especially if I feel like it wouldn't fit the characters and the rest of the book.

This book starts out when two sisters, Lulu and Merry, are little and their father kills their mother and stabs the younger of the two girls. The rest of the book follows the two girls over the next 30 years through living with family, group homes, foster homes and then into adulthood.  They wrestle with how people treat them because of who they are and their story.  Each of them reacts very differently, in particularly in regard to the relationship each has with their father who is in prison.  It was simply amazing how invested I was in each character.

This is Randy Susan Meyers first novel and I have added her next novel, which is supposed to published next February, to my "to-read" list.  Each chapter was told from either Lulu's or Merry's perspective but I was so impressed how she would introduce something in one chapter with one character and then resolve it in the next chapter through the other girl.  I have read a lot of books in the same style, but none that pulled that off as well as this one.  I really hope that her next novel is in the next style.