It was at a family Sunday lunch when the sisters first heard the news. They were at their mother’s house, the home where they had grown up. Older sister Lauren was there with her three young kids and husband Simon. Kate was there alone, her husband Matt having to work. She understands, as she’s a journalist too and knows that their stories don’t always follow a convenient timeline. And their mother Rose is there, alone, as their father had died the year before.

That was when she showed up for the first time. A woman younger than Kate, saying that her name is Jess and asking for their father. After being prodded about why she was there, she finally answers. She’s Lauren and Kate’s half-sister.

Jess had come to meet her father for the first time, not realizing that he had passed away, and not realizing that her news would turn the family upside down as each woman scrambled to process the news.

Lauren believed Jess. Lauren and her father didn’t get along, and she was the one who had uploaded her DNA to the website in the first place, hoping to find a distant relative. Although a half-sister certainly wasn’t what she was looking for, Lauren is happy to welcome Jess to the family.

Kate, however, had a very strong bond with their father and can’t for a second believe that he might do something like this. She isn’t willing to allow for the possibility that he could have fathered a child outside of his marriage, and she decides to use all her journalistic skill and contacts to find out the truth, no matter what.

But as Lauren continues to befriend Jess, and Kate continues to investigate her, neither sister can imagine the potential destruction of their family they themselves are helping to bring down. As secrets come to light and accusations start to fly, Kate and Lauren do everything they can to keep their family together. But will it be enough, or was it too late as soon as they first opened that door to their half-sister?

Author Sandie Jones is back with The Half-Sister, a family thriller filled with lies and secrets that will keep you turning pages until the very end. This twisted story of challenging family relationships will have you questioning all of the characters, all of the facts, until almost the very last page. And even then, you’ll be shaking your head, trying to understand what you just read.

I enjoyed The Half-Sister, but I found the suddenness of the ending a little jarring. I’m someone who likes to wind down with the story slowly, letting go of the characters little by little to ease back into reality. And this book ends quickly and suddenly, with no time to wind down. But it’s still a good story, an enjoyable journey, and I’m glad I got the chance to read it.

Galleys for The Half-Sister were provided by St. Martin’s Press through NetGalley, with many thanks.

A story of family and secrets and lies and what happens when a secret is unexpectedly revealed.. When Jess knocks on the door looking for Kate and Lauren's dead father Kate isn't sure what to think. Kate was close to her father and refuses to believe it but there is DNA evidence. Kate decides it can't be true and vows to figure out the truth.

This book is a quick and addictive read! I liked this book more than I thought I would. I saw a lot of middle-of-the-road reviews, but many of them cite the fact that this is not much of a thriller. That is true, it is more of a family drama/suspenseful drama kind of book. But since I knew that going in... I guess it didn't bother me as much.

The book begins with a girl showing up at a family dinner and claiming to be the love-child of the recently deceased patriarch of the family. She has the DNA to prove it. Will this be the straw that breaks the camel's back for this family who is already growing apart?

I liked the characters' struggles and found the book kept me flipping pages! I was confused by the ending a bit. I don't want to give anything away, but I thought some people were a bit too forgiving. I also maybe wish that the half sister's motives were a little more sketchy and sinister then they turned out to be, but all in all it was a quick, engaging read.

MY RATING:
Characters: 4
Story: 3
Overall: 3.5 stars

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.
See more reviews @ mamaneedsabook.blogspot.com

Sandie Jones is such a good author. I really enjoyed this book. I loved the twists and turns. I did not want to put the book down. I have ordered this book for the library and I feel many patrons will enjoy this book.

In The Half Sister by Sandie Jones, sisters Kate and Lauren have had a contentious relationship for years. When a young woman named Jess shows up looking for her father – their father – the novel moves forward and becomes a page turner.

Kate cannot believe her father would cheat on her mother while Lauren has no doubts he would. The sisters had very different relationships with their father, who is now deceased.

Kate’s reporter instincts have her in sleuth mode as she searches for answers while Lauren immediately accepts Jess as her sister. While their mother may know something about the whole situation, she reveals little. On top of it all, Kate deals with infertility problems, which she keeps to herself, while Lauren puts on a false front to hide her troubled marriage with an emotionally abusive husband.

Who is Jess, and why don’t her stories about college and such check out? Why is she making moves on Kate’s husband Matt? And why is her second bedroom a nursery? These and other questions are answered in The Half Sisters.

I found the ending to be abrupt and not as satisfying as it might have been. It was the twist readers expect in a Sandie Jones novel but it wasn’t as plausible as in her other books. I also had doubts about some of the information regarding DNA being used to find relatives.

Sandie Jones created a masterful page-turner with The First Mistake, which is why I was eager to read her latest book. Jones, a freelance journalist for more than 20 years, has written for the Sunday Times, Woman’s Weekly, and the Daily Mail. She lives in London with her family.

My review will be posted on Goodreads starting June 18, 2020.

I would like to thank Minotaur Books, St. Martin’s Press, and NetGalley for providing me with an ARC in return for an objective review.

This book was definitely a page-turner. Nobody was who you thought they were - - and there was plenty of crafty misdirection and red herrings. Lots of family drama and twists of mystery before the final revelation. I had guessed some of the ending but not everything. Very entertaining!

TLDR: The only decent people in this book are under the age of 6.

This is my second book from Jones and will be my last. There’s a subset of mystery/suspense/thriller authors that can’t seem to write likable (to me) female characters (Ware, Lapena, Paris, etc.) and she is joining that list for me. Kate’s mind blowing naïveté about her father as a 34 year old woman was too much to bear, and Lauren was just agency-less and spineless. Jess was a plot device up until the last couple chapters and Rose was an overused trope.

Worst of all, it was insanely predictable. I’m not even sure you could call it domestic suspense because I never felt the suspense. It was just a really melodramatic family drama sprinkled with domestic violence by one of the biggest caricatures I’ve ever had the misfortune to read and random TTC threads that never really connected to the rest of the story.

I can’t deal with plots that would unravel if people would just have a conversation with each other and that’s essentially what this was.

It all starts with a family dinner that is interrupted by Jess who is seeking her father. After this dinner, the reader embarks on a journey in which the truth is sought after and to find out if Jess is who she says she is. Sandie Jones has written another fast paced, family suspense that has you guessing and trying to solve the mystery with the characters. I enjoyed reading the story from the dual characters: Kate and Lauren. The dual voices gives the reader the opportunity to get to know both sisters, along with reminding them that we all have secrets.

Thank you Netgalley for my advanced review copy. All opinions in this review are my own.

Thank you to NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for my honest review. I think this review will be difficult to write as I'm not totally sure how I felt about it, even after thinking about it for a few days. This book wasn't a super wild, edge of your seat thriller, but it had a couple twists that surprised me. I thought I had it figured out, but I was pleasantly surprised to be wrong, which I enjoyed. However, none of the characters were very likeable at all. I felt like Kate's fertility issues were a strange addition to the story, but I also thought Lauren's issues were strange and only necessary for a side-part to the story. There was a lot going on, I guess you could say, that didn't necessarily tie into the overall story of the half sister.

I almost gave up on it. It felt like a struggle to force myself through it. While the overall story ended up being pretty good with some surprises, there was a lot of unnecessary story lines throughout, I felt. I wished the characters had a few redeeming qualities so I could have liked them, but they all felt weak to me. This entire book could have been avoided if everyone had just spoken to one another. I was a fan of the last Sandie Jones book I read, so I will pick up another, but this one wasn't my favourite.

Really liked this book it was a first read from this author but it won't be the last I loved all the twist's and turn's just when I thought I had it figured it out thing's took a turn in another direction..

I finally finished The Half Sister this morning and I really, really loved it! I love a book that has fun twists and turns. I went into reading The Half Sister without knowing much about the plot or story and I was so pleasantly surprised. I love Sandie Jones writing and I am definitely going to keep an eye out for her future books as well. Thank you so much for allowing me to read this before it's release date!

Another huge HOME RUN for Ms Jones with this novel.She just keeps getting better and better.

It came out yesterday, and if you haven't tried Ms Jones in the past, now is a good time.

Like her prior novels, Ms Jones writes female centered novels with a what you see(read - ha ha) isn't always what you get.

Intrigued?

You should be. The Half Sister is that good.

I will admit that I didn't immediately get into the book from the first few pages, as I wasn't exactly sure what to think but that quickly changed (very quickly).


I highly recommend this fast paced smartly written novel. It's a pay attention type of novel and I saw most of what was coming...(hint: BUY THE BOOK😊)

Sisters Kate and Lauren couldn’t be more different. When a total stranger shows up at their mother’s house while they’re having lunch, their world’s are turned upside down. The girl claims to be their half-sister, with a DNA test as proof. Suddenly secrets that have been buried for decades are revealed, secrets that threaten to tear the family apart.
The Half Sister is told in the first-person, alternating between the perspectives of Kate and Lauren. I found myself identifying more with Lauren and I’m not sure why.

When I first read the synopsis of The Half Sister, I had no idea how the story was going to unfold. However, I was pleasantly surprised by the twisty thriller that presented itself. The pacing was significantly slower than Jones’ last book The First Mistake, but it was still a quick read, and thoroughly more plausible. If you like twisty, domestic thrillers, The Half Sister is for you. It will keep you guessing right up until the end.

Thank you to Netgalley and Minotaur Books for the review copy! All opinions are my own.

What a story. I should have learned from past experience with a Sandie Jones story that what you see is not always what you get, but I got sucked in just like always. You think you’ve figured it out, you know what has happened, is happening and will happen. You think you’ve identified the heroes and the villains and can just coast along until the end. But then you realize these characters are so well developed and nuanced that you really don’t know them as well as you thought. So you really don’t understand what’s going on, and you certainly can’t predict the future.

The Half Sister is full of almost-likable people. This is another thing author Sandie Jones does oh so well. You sympathize with them, feel sorry for them, and at times are even bored with them, but then they act in a way that isn’t all that nice and you realize you don’t like them very much. As layers are peeled back and more and more is revealed your loyalty and allegiance shift back and forth.

Kate and Lauren are sisters. Lauren and her mother Rose are close and always have been, or so it seems to Kate. She was closer to her late father, and still misses him terrible. Kate thinks Lauren has the life Kate wants. Sure, her husband Simon is a bit of a jerk but she’s got those three beautiful children. Lauren thinks Kate’s life is the one to envy – successful in business, not tied down with kids, no money problems, living the easy life with her husband Matt. But Kate and Matt have been trying for what seems like forever to have a child. This is their last attempt. Their mother Rose almost fades into the background. Just another widow adjusting to life without her husband. And then Jess shows up claiming Harry was her father and demanding to be accepted into the family. And Lauren has a chance encounter with her old boyfriend Justin. So how could anything be the same from that point on?

I was quite annoyed with most of the characters initially. Everyone seemed to be lying, hiding something, mean-spirited, with a hidden agenda and not caring who they hurt in their attempt to get what they want or feel they deserve. And then I realized that was author Sandie Jones’ whole point – there is so much going on under the surface and behind the scenes that I was soon riveted, couldn’t stop reading.

A Sandie Jones book is not a book you pick up, read a couple of chapters, and put down and walk away for a day or so, and The Half Sister fits the mold. Plan to spend some time because once you start you’re hooked. You’ll be sad and angry and happy and wary and confused. But always unable to put it down, unable to stop turning pages as fast as you can. And satisfied with the ending.

Thanks to Minotaur Books and NetGalley for providing an advance copy of The Half Sister for my hones review. All opinions are my own. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and recommend it without hesitation.

Another great book by Sandie Jones!

Sisters getting together with their mom for their Sunday family gathering, a knock on the door changes everything for them. Kate and Lauren are faced with the fact their deceased father had another daughter or whose daughter is she actually? Kate having a reporting background starts to dig into Jess's past. Is she really who she says she is? Did her beloved father really have an affair like their mother says he did? For Lauren, who has a secret and what is her role for putting her DNA on a site and being matched with Jess? What role does their mother play in all this? What is it she's trying to hide?

I really liked this book, just when you think you have it figured it out, another twist is thrown in. I look forward to more books by Sandie Jones.

This story is about two sisters with completely different lives.

When I first started this I figured I wasn't going to like it and I was correct. The whole story was just very boring to me..The characters were annoying and very dull. This book felt like it had no real mystery, no real plot, and no real point. This was more of a family drama vs a mystery/thriller. Very predictable. I was very bored throughout the story.

I enjoyed one of the characters dealing with IVF but that is about it.

I will not be buying a copy of this book. Thank you NetGalley & St. Martins Press for this copy!

Everyone said this was a page turner, but I felt like it was SO slow until the very end, when it picked up crazy fast in the last 30 or so pages. I also didn’t connect to the characters very much and felt like they were dull and very two dimensional. I thought the plot was also very predictable, despite the attempt at a lot of twists and turns.

I appreciated the use of DNA to connect the sisters and how that small piece played a part all the way to the very end.

Less of a thriller, more a family drama, this book is about two sisters, who have very different views of their parents. The older sister, Lauren, connects more with her mother, and has done since childhood. The younger sister was more connected with her father. After their father's death, another woman shows up and claims to be their half sister, it throws the entire family into the past, and has them questioning everything they thought they knew. A slower burn, the last fifth of the book really picks up, although I saw the ending a mile away. I'd say this is a very solid, entertaining but predictable read.

Sandie Jones is awesome so you know that when you start reading one of her books you're in for a great treat. This book is so good. Imagine a stranger knocking on your door claiming to be your half sister. You know massive drama is going to ensure. And you know as that drama gets bigger and bigger other things are going to start popping up. Edge of your seat reading. Needs top spot on your TBR stack. Happy reading!

Addictive domestic suspense. The story is to.d in alternating POV from Lauren and Kate. While having lunch with their mom Jess shows up at the door claiming to be their 1/2 sister. Is she or is she not? As Lauren and Kate begin to learn more about Jess skeletons are definitely coming out of the closet. Maybe the family wasn’t as perfect as everyone thought.