One winter evening when I was fifteen, I attended a very thrilling, very strange dinner party with my family. My dad, an adoptee, had been invited to meet his biological father and siblings for the first time, and although I’d glimpsed a few pictures, it still shocked me to see first-hand how much he looked (and talked, and even walked) like them.
The experience made me wonder about the other things two siblings might share—habits, hobbies, maybe even vices?—despite having spent a lifetime apart. What came out of these questions, many years later, was Favorite Daughter, my novel about two half-sisters who are unknowingly thrown together by their father’s dying wish.
The eldest, Mickey, is a kindergarten teacher and a struggling alcoholic, while Arlo is a leading psychotherapist: professional and seemingly put-together. When their late father’s will unites them as therapist and patient—with neither having any idea that they’re sisters—they start on a collision course that could break, or perhaps save, them both.
That’s the thing about sisters in particular: they have a way of showing up in each other’s lives (sometimes rather chaotically) no matter what forces have separated them. And even when kept apart, they still manage to shape each other.
Here are seven books that show the many ways a “long-lost” sister can be found.
Interesting Facts About Space by Emily Austin
Enid has one very pesky phobia: she’s terrified of bald men. Until now, she’s managed to suppress this fear—and the difficult memories at its root—by listening to true crime podcasts on repeat and talking to her mom about interesting space facts rather than feelings. Then Enid’s absentee father dies, her two estranged half-sisters reappear in her life, and the past comes bubbling up. A darkly funny and tender story about trauma, healing, and the value of human connection.
We Should Not Be Afraid of the Sky by Emma Hooper
An immersive work of historical fiction, Emma Hooper’s third novel follows five young girls growing up in a small Portuguese fishing village at the edge of the Roman Empire. Though raised in different households, the girls are actually sisters, and as they grow up picking lemons together in the village orchards, sharing gossip and whispering secrets, they develop a fierce bond. When the girls are abducted and brought to the home of the local commander, they must part ways. Will their connection persist despite the separation?
What Happened to Ruthy Ramirez by Claire Jimenez
When thirteen-year-old Ruthy Ramirez goes missing one night after track practice, she leaves a hole in her family that never fully closes. Years later, long after the police have stopped looking for her, Ruthy’s sisters Nina and Jessica are just trying to get by, scraping together enough cash to support their families while navigating a fraught relationship with their mother. Then they glimpse a familiar face while watching a reality TV show called Catfight. A woman from the show, Ruby, looks uncannily like their sister—and it turns out she’s only a few hours away.
Notes on Your Sudden Disappearance by Alison Espach
Most will know Alison Espach from her recent release The Wedding People, but this novel from 2022 is every bit as honest and raw. Inspired by the loss of Espach’s own brother, Notes follows teenager Sally before and after the death of her older sister Kathy in a car crash. As the years pass, Sally finds herself strangely (and inconveniently) drawn to Kathy’s heartthrob boyfriend, the only person who seems to understand the void Kathy’s absence has created.
Hello Beautiful by Ann Napolitano
The four Padavano sisters—ambitious Julia, starry-eyed Sylvie, passionate Cecilia, and caring Emeline—feel most like themselves when they’re together. They’ve grown up under one (admittedly chaotic) roof with their Catholic Italian parents, sharing even their most closely-guarded secrets with one another. Then Julia marries a college basketball player named William, and the ensuing chain of events causes a decades-long rift the sisters could’ve never previously imagined.
Older Sister. Not Necessarily Related. by Jenny Heijun Wills
In this visceral memoir, Jenny Heijun Wills recounts her upbringing as a transnational adoptee and the complicated fallout of her eventual reunion with her birth family. Born in Korea, Wills was adopted into a white family in Ontario, Canada as an infant. Decades later, when she travelled to Korea as an adult to meet her biological parents and siblings, the experience was far from the storybook ending one might imagine. A powerful book about family ties and the messy process of healing.
Clap When You Land by Elizabeth Acevedo
This fiercely-written YA novel-in-verse alternates between the perspectives of Camino and Yahaira Rios, two half-sisters brought together by their father’s sudden death. Before the plane crash, Papi lived two different lives, spending part of the year in the Dominican Republic with Camino and the rest of it in New York City with Yahaira, and neither girl knew the other existed. Now the girls must go on without him, grappling with old secrets and an uncertain future.
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