Blood Sisters

I picked up Blood Sisters for a book club and honestly thought it might feel like “homework.” Instead, I flew through it. This is one of those books that takes a very real issue, missing and murdered indigenous women, and turns it into a tense, character-driven mystery without talking down to you or turning trauma into a lecture. I never felt preached at. I felt like I was being invited into the lived reality of people whose land, families, and futures have been stolen, and then asked to sit with how brutal that actually is. We follow Syd, a Cherokee archeologist with the Bureau of Indian Affairs, who has tried very hard to build a life far from Oklahoma and heal from the trauma of one night she barely survived. Syd is called home when a skull is found with her old badge in its teeth, and her sister Emma Lou disappears. I immediately feel the, “Oh no, we are going back there,” dread right alongside her. Most of this book is Syd chipping away at secrets the town would rather bury, and I felt just as frustrated as her with all the people keeping secrets. I did not see a few things coming. Especially the reveal that Pete and Luna survived was wild, and the twist that Gracie was not an imaginary friend, but Luna's real child, whom Emma Lou’s daughter was playing with. Pete still being alive, trafficking drugs, and hurting women made my blood boil. It was infuriating that Rodney Dove cut that deal to get Pete out of Oklahoma, then let the murdered girls turn into campfire stories instead of solved cases. He absolutely could have used that deal to take down the ring, bring closure to families, and protect future generations. He failed them. I appreciated that his daughter, Sue, is the one who cleans up the mess he helped create. What really worked for me is how Syd gets a twisted, painful second chance at the night she cannot forget. She has been carrying so much guilt and survivor's shame. Coming back to Picher lets her stop running from it and actually redo the moment where the devil got away. She confronts Pete, rescues her sister, exposes the boneyard of missing girls, uncovers a drug trafficking ring, stops a land grab, and finally stops letting that one night define her entire life. Syd even makes room for Luna to get her justice. Luna’s line, “It’s always been me, and it will end with me,” followed by her emptying the gun into Pete, was such a cathartic moment. I wanted to whoop when Sue immediately made sure everyone knew Luna would not be punished for defending herself from the devil. The only piece that felt thin to me was the follow-through on the girls in the boneyard. We get the epilogue, wrapping up the original skull in Rhode Island. I wanted a little more time with those families being notified and those girls being brought home in Oklahoma. After spending a whole book centering on the fact that Native girls go missing and no one looks for them, I was craving a bit more on that justice finally landing. On the flip side, the land grab and environmental injustice pieces were incredibly eye-opening. I knew energy companies had their claws deep in Oklahoma. I did not realize how many layers there are to who owns the land, how easily rights can be leased, stolen, resold, and weaponized against the very people who should be protected. Lillie weaves all of that into the plot in a way that feels organic. Just like in real life, it is messy, confusing, and infuriating. The writing itself is excellent. The pacing intentionally slows down in places, which worked for me because it mirrored how investigations actually stall and lurch, and it gave room for the history and politics to land. For the most part, I was on the edge of my seat, especially once Syd starts poking at powerful people who would rather she just go back to Rhode Island and stay quiet. My one real meh was the relationship with Mal and the pregnancy. I never fully bought into their dynamic. Syd reads as hyper independent and emotionally guarded, and I did not feel much actual connection from her side. The pregnancy thread felt like it wandered in from another book. I did, however, really appreciate the inclusion of Two Spirit history and how that contextualizes Syd’s queerness. Learning about that story and framing queerness through Indigenous tradition, not just modern labels, was fascinating. Overall, Blood Sisters is suspenseful, angry in all the right ways, and surprisingly hopeful. It gives you a gripping mystery, pulls the curtain back on land theft and environmental poisoning, and demands that you pay attention to the thousands of Indigenous women and girls who go missing and are never given a voice.

Compelling, heartbreaking, and very impactful. I did not see that end coming! Betrayal, double crossing, and deep rooted mistrust. Such a fantastic story. Book #97 in 2024