I have read several books recently and I just wasn’t liking any of them. I wasn’t sure if it was me or if it was the books so I decided not to write about them. But I was very happy to read The Murderer’s Daughters because it was one of those books that I didn’t even want to put down.
This is the story of Lulu and Merry. Lulu was seven and Merry was five when their father murdered their mother, injured Merry and tried to kill himself. The story is told through both sisters so their different reactions and emotions are shown. Lulu lives with the guilt that she may have allowed the murder to happen by letting her dad in that day and hesitating when her mom told her to get help. As the girls travel through family member’s, an orphanage and a foster family Lulu remains the strong protector and tries to bury the past to make a better life for herself. She does not visit her father in prison and does what she can to distance herself from the reputation of being a murderer’s daughter by telling people she was orphaned later in life.
Merry carries the physical scars of the attack and also some sense of responsibility and connectedness to her dad. She visits him in prison for the thirty plus years that he is there and works through different stages in a relationship with him. Merry is portrayed as being weaker and more emotional…as though she needs protection and defending from Lulu. Yet Merry has a lot of strength in the way she faces her past and what has happened.
16/05/2010 at 9:58 am Permalink
Do you still have this? I would like to read it.