Sister Acts: a Novel

“Big-hearted, incisive novel of four sisters over fractious decades. … Rich with psychological insight, but the storytelling is swift, even dishy, as the sisters build lives whose courses are never predictable. Reyes is adept at capturing how big dreams give way to everyday compromise. — Booklife by Publishers Weekly “An eventful and emotionally intense family saga. … Reyes shows, with skill and sensitivity, what coping mechanisms can look like when one’s world falls apart and one must face a new reality.” — Kirkus ReviewsFour sisters. Four clashing personalities. Four different ways of living in the world.Sister Acts explores the impact of loss on three generations of one family –- in particular, the degree to which, to paraphrase Phyllis Chesler, women are capable of inhumanity toward other women. At times heartbreaking and at times hilarious, the novel illuminates the resilience that can come from knowing one’s roots and the estrangement that can result from trying to escape them.Sophie Malinsky’s sudden death leaves her Left-wing Jewish family in disarray. Rather than bringing her young daughters closer, the loss creates a tangle of jealousies and recriminations. Rose, the eldest, recognizing their father’s limitations, at first tries to become a surrogate mother for her three sisters. But they resent her efforts, each one channeling – or repressing – her grief in a different way. In the absence of Sophie’s love and guidance, two sisters lose their way. Naomi moves to Mexico and tries to shed her Jewish identity. Betti ends up in Nashville pursuing a dream, never realized, of stardom as a rockabilly musician. A fourth sister, Marla, strives for dominance from an early age. Her jealousy of Rose leads to a toxic rivalry that persists well into middle age, affecting their own daughters as well. Lurking behind the conflicts is a family secret that Sophie had planned, but failed, to reveal. Decades later, when Rose finally uncovers it, the Malinskys’ saga finally comes into sharp focus.