Riley, L: Missing Sister

The supposedly last book of the Seven Sisters, which is now the second last, because Lucinda Riley promised an 8th novel with the Story of Pa Salt left me with an unsatisfying feeling. The onset of the storyline is that Georg, the sisters’ lawyer, leaves them with a piece of an information about the missing sister. Ensues a chase around the world, where all the sisters try to get close to Mary, who feels chased and runs back to Ireland. There she wants to find answers about her past and find out about the reason she initially left for New Zealand over 30 years ago and is still terrified nowadays. In my opinion, this was really the least enjoyable book of the series. The writing style is bleak and I really got the strong feeling that single words are used to identify the country of residence. Chérie for Switzerland and France, Sláinte and eejit or jaysus for Ireland. The fact that all the characters use any excuse to drink strong alcohol (at any time of the day) is downright annoying towards the end of the novel. The parallel storylines for the historical and present part were less well intertwined than in the other novels. Firstly, you do not really follow how Nuala’s story is linked to the one of Mary. Secondly, even if you get some answers, they are not really satisfactory, as Mary is herself an adopted kid. Nuala’s storyline during the war of Independence for Ireland made me really want to dig deeper in the subject. Whereas Mary’s storyline can be summarized in being chased by the sisters around the world and trying to face her fears of the past. I appreciated getting the glimpse of all the sisters’ life, but they really play a secondary role in the main storyline. SPOILER ALERT For instance, the fact that the encounter between Tilly and Mary basically soothes Mary so much she wants to sleep. I believe there is a bit more depth to Tilly’s character than just making people sleep… Interestingly the person that potentially has all the answers, the lawyer Georg, is away during all the chase and comes around at the end to fix an unfortunate misunderstanding. Other “problematic” characters, such as Nora, Mary’s sister, is abroad and does not raise trouble during the family reunion. SPOILERS OFF So all in all, I’m slightly disappointed by this novel. For someone that has read all the novels of the Seven Sisters’ series, I would say, go along with it, but don’t expect a lot. I went with these lower expectations, so wasn’t really expecting much, but this feeling of missing something is following through. There are a lot of single elements thrown in, which add lose strings to the narrative rather than providing answers and a well crafted storyline.