Kate is a young and talented war reporter who has recently ended up in a mental hospital and will only be out within few days. Haunted by her experiences while reporting as well as images she saw when she came back home, Kate has issues with trying to realize what is real and what is a mere creation of her mind. As she begins to describe her journey, and how she ended up there, a horrifying truth will begin to emerge that will dare to upend everything she holds dear.

Dealing with post-traumatic stress disorder as well as alcoholism and a childhood of abuse, MY SISTER'S BONES doesn't shy away from difficult subjects and instead lays everything out on the table, which makes it an important read in today's world. Nualla Ellwood is talented in lulling the reader to perceive characters in a certain away when one feels as if the other sister is lying, but then in unexpected moments, she stuns the reader and pulls the rug from underneath them.

I loved everything about MY SISTER'S BONES by Nualla Ellwood; the tension, the mystery, the well-drawn main and secondary characters that play a big role in Kate's life as well as a tale that dares to play with illusions others build of themselves. There are a lot of unpredictable twists and turns in the story that will lead to a mind shattering conclusion. I also loved the cover and the fact that the story is seen from both sisters' point of view rather than just one sister telling her side of the story. The only disappointment I was able to have with MY SISTER'S BONES is that I didn't read it sooner and that I waited a long time before picking it up.

For a reader that loved A.J Finn's THE WOMAN IN THE WINDOW, and is seeking to fulfill the hole that THE WOMAN IN THE WINDOW has left, MY SISTER'S BONES by Nualla Ellwood will a be psychological treat where nothing is at it seems, and where one can cut the tension with a knife

Book Summary

In the vein of Fiona Barton’s The Widow and Renée Knight’s Disclaimer, My Sister's Bones is a psychological thriller about a war reporter who returns to her childhood home after her mother’s death and becomes convinced that all is not well in the house next door—but is what she’s seeing real or a symptom of the trauma she suffered in Syria? The One Person You Should Trust Is Lying to You…

Kate has spent fifteen years bringing global injustice home: as a decorated war reporter, she’s always in a place of conflict, writing about ordinary people in unimaginable situations. When her mother dies, Kate returns home from Syria for the funeral. But an incident with a young Syrian boy haunts her dreams, and when Kate sees a boy in the garden of the house next door—a house inhabited by an Iraqi refugee who claims her husband is away and she has no children—Kate becomes convinced that something is very wrong.

As she struggles to separate her memories of Syria from the quiet town in which she grew up—and also to reconcile her memories of a traumatic childhood with her sister’s insistence that all was not as Kate remembers—she begins to wonder what is actually true…and what is just in her mind.

In this gripping, timely debut, Nuala Ellwood brings us an unforgettable damaged character, a haunting , humanizing look at the Syrian conflict, and a deeply harrowing psychological thriller that readers won’t be able to put down.

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