Review: When We Were Sisters by Cynthia Ellingsen

When We Were Sisters

by Cynthia Ellingsen

Publisher: Bookouture

Pages: 281

Format: eARC

Buy the Book: Amazon

Goodreads:  Two sisters who haven’t spoken for twenty years. One summer to bring a family back together.

Jayne Winters hasn’t seen her sister Charlotte since that last childhood holiday at their grandmother’s North Carolina beach house. Separated after that summer by their parents in a bitter divorce, Charlotte has never forgiven Jayne for not fighting to stay together.

So when Jayne discovers that they have both inherited the beach house, and that their grandmother’s last wish was for them to renovate it together, it feels like a miracle: one last chance to win her sister back.

At first Charlotte will barely speak to her. But slowly the memories of swimming races and storytelling in their attic bedroom looking over the sea start to break down the wall between them. With the help of photographs and letters left by their grandmother for them to find, the two women begin to restore not just the creaking mahogany staircase and the faded antique wallpaper, but their own relationship.

But then Jayne discovers that Charlotte has kept a heart-stopping secret from their past from her. Can she find it in her heart to forgive her sister and keep their grandmother’s dream of reuniting them alive—or are some wounds too big to heal?

Kritters Thoughts:  A concept that has been used before, but I will read it every time!  An elderly relative lives a home to the kids in their life and has them renovate to hopefully bring them together and repair a house and their relationship at the same time.  Jayne and Charlotte were separated as young girls as their parents relationship dissolved and really raised as single children until their grandmother brought them together one summer, but this summer ended and so did their connection until their grandmother brought them home again.

I loved how this book knew what it was and they referenced Parent Trap because although they aren't twins, their story definitely had the feeling of the separated at birth and raised in two very different lifestyles from California to Ireland.  These girls both blamed the other parent for the upbringing they missed out on and it took both of these girls coming together to both heal from all of the hurt.  

I loved this one like I have loved the others where a family gets restored and there is hope for the future that they will set a different path for future generations.

Rating: definitely a good read, but can't read two in a row

Ebook 2021 Challenge: 97 out of 100

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I received one copy of this book free of charge from Bookouture.  I was not required to write a positive review in exchange for receipt of the book; rather, the opinions expressed in this review are my own.