This book took me a while to get into, but once I got engrossed in the Chapel sisters' lives, I really enjoyed it. There is a sinister and slightly supernatural tone running through the narrative, which provides a great sense of dread as you're reading. It was important to have the set up of the sisters' relationships to feel the tension and loss when the deaths began, but I didn't truly appreciate that while I was reading the set up portion - I felt it was a bit slow and not what I had expected. However, from about the 150 page mark, the book had me hooked and I was intrigued to see how the family curse would manifest. Overall, I really enjoyed the book and would definitely recommend it for people who like family sagas with a Gothic element.
I received a free copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for a fair and honest review.

A suspenseful and gothic novel with very dark and spooky themes; overall just what I love. 5 Stars!

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for a copy of the novel in exchange for an honest review

🎨🎨🎨🎨🎨

#TheCherryRobbers by @saraiwalkerauthor has broken me. It is gorgeous, sumptuous and all consuming. I can only compare my reaction to this book with #StillLife by @sarahwinman. I didn't think I would have a book of the year but I think this might be it. Wow.

🤍"Women are raised to be accommodating, so I suppose a woman who draws clear lines that others are not allowed to cross becomes remarkable for that fact alone."

For me, it was hard not to identify with Iris. She's an extraordinary character. The urge to protect those she loves, but to also run to anywhere that might offer greater safety, or anonymity, or life resonates.

🤍"In the middle of the meadow, I stopped and knelt down. I had new rituals now. I covered my face with my hands , inhaled deeply, then I screamed."

It's easy to read Iris as powerless, trapped in her situation but the power is hers to take if she wants it.

🤍"Running away, as I had suspected , wasn’t an easy thing to do; if it was, more women would do it. I wondered if my accident was a sign. If so, I was afraid to know what it meant."

Walkers book makes me want to cry. Not great having sobs but the soft, gentle tears of relief. There are moments where I can only recommend the book itself over any explanation.

🤍"Beneath the sky, I felt like nothing but a tiny speck in the universe; I’ll eventually blow away, a particle of dust. I enjoyed that feeling of smallness."

Isn't it amazing how you can pick up a book that feels like an extension of yourself and just fall in love with it. As Walker asks us, what is a life without love?

Thanks to @serpentstail, @viper & @netgalley for a free e-ARC in return for an unbiased review.

Not for me unfortunately, I couldn't get into this novel but thank you for allowing me to read an advanced copy

very reminiscent of books such as the seven husbands of evelyn hugo, where an older woman recounts her tale. i just happen not to like the woman here and her story was a bit meh. also it was marketed as lgbtq+ ....which it was, tangentially.

I very much enjoyed The Cherry Robbers and look forward to seeing what comes next for Sarai Walker. It seriously hasn't gotten the hype it deserves.

The Cherry Robbers is a beautifully written historical Gothic queer fiction. The characters are captivating, the scenery is atmospheric and the story flows beautifully between duel timelines. I loved this book and have been singing it's praises to everyone and anyone on repeat.

“This story is jagged, could cut a deep wound. It isn’t a story I can tell with a thread and a needle, stitching in clean lines. It’s shards or nothing.”

You know when they say “don’t judge a book by it’s cover”? I chose this book because I loved the cover. Didn’t actually have a clue what it was about but I thought it looked pretty. It was such a good choice, the writing and the story are both excellent.

The whole novel is told as diary entries from Sylvia Wren, an artist and recluse who barely leaves the house. She is haunted by the ghosts of her past that she has been running from most of her life. Her life when she was Iris Chapel.

“Sylvia Wren is a ghost …What a terrible thing to be a ghost while still alive.”

The Chapel firearms dynasty are an odd bunch. Their father is absent, even on their annual holiday he stays in the room working, away from his family, only making an occasional appearance to ensure that all appears to be ok with his wife and children. Their mother never wanted to marry, didn’t want to have children and yet has had 6 girls, all of whom rely on each other for company.

“Most children can’t imagine their mothers having a life before them, but for my sisters and me, it was the opposite. The wedding day was always the end of her story. We were the epilogue.”

From the start of the novel we know that Iris is the only one of the 6 sisters to survive, she has escaped her past and is living under a new name.

This is a slow burn, gothic mystery. It’s an exploration of femininity and neglect. The need to be loved and the need to escape. I was completely sucked in by the story and the writing, there are unanswered questions at the end which was frustrating but the journey to the end was amazing.

I'm not sure what to think about this book. I still dont' really know why five of the six Chapel sisters died. This is not a spoiler by the way! I feel I may have only skimmed the surface of this novel and not managed to delve deep inside. Could be me. I did love the writing though.

Walker's "The Cherry Robbers" did not live up to my expectations, albeit being gothic-y and an acute meditation on grief and traditional femininity.

The Cherry Robbers is a beautiful, captivating, atmospheric read: the story of a large family, and of the destiny of 6 sisters. It is quite clear what such destiny is going to be from early on in the book, but it keeps you reading and wanting to find out more, nonetheless.
It losely reminded me of some Latin America Literaure, with the use of magical realism and visions and ghosts; so, if you, like me, love Marquez or Allende I'm sure you will adore this book. For me, definitely a 5 star read!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with an arc in exchange for an honest review.

Seeing as it’s Pride month, this seemed like a good book with which to start June. So, The Cherry Robbers…I still haven’t decided what I think of this book. There are such conflicting ways I view it. For example, I don’t enjoy ‘slow’ books, yet I enjoyed reading this one…even when thinking how bored I was with the excruciatingly slow pace! I didn’t think that was possible! I became incredibly invested in finding out what happened to the girls, so I kept having these real problems. I know that I just don’t care enough about a book when I feel grumpy that I have to read it, as it was with this book…but at the same time I desperately wanted to know the story of this family that was so destroyed decades before the book was set. It was almost hypnotic, this way that Walker wrote their stories. Her writing created an ambience, an ethereal stmosphere that was almost, but not quite Gothic in style and feel. It feels suffocating and dangerous, and it’s quite amazing that any children could survive and grow in such a bleak environment, but it’s no surprise that these children could and would grow into damaged adults.

Set in 2017, the book revolves around the narrator, Sylvia Wren. Sylvia is a famed recluse, and rather paradoxically, a huge star in the world of the arts. On one of her few trips into the outside world, she picks up her mail from her PO Box and rushes back home to open it, where she feels the most safe. Inside is a letter from an investigative journalist Eliza Mortimer, telling the tale of how a woman she had recently met at a luncheon for the Sandler Museum, had told a tale of a tiny village in Conneticut, where she grew up, named Bellflower Village. This woman, Pauline Levasseur, let slip (after much champagne) that she knew a secret about Sylvia. This shook Sylvia enough that she panicked and tried to hide away from a letter which she has already opened. Here, Walker manages to craft a picture of panic and anxiety that is quite visceral, certainly to me as an anxiety sufferer, which is impressive as I’m usually let down by descriptions of anxiety in books. I have employed such avoidance tactics before in a desperate effort to cope with a situation in which I felt a lack of control, as the character obviously does here. When Sylvia forces herself back to the letter she seemingly finds exactly what she dreaded. The secret is that Pauline Levasseur recognises Sylvia, but knows her as Iris Chapel, one of a number of sisters from Bellflower Village daughters of the famed gunmaking family, the Chapels. Something terrible happened to the Chapel sisters, but nobody really knows what. It seems that Iris disappeared when she was around 20 years old, in the late ‘50’s. Obviously, the journalist smelled a story so went digging around until she began to believe Mrs Levasseur, and has lined up opportunities with several editors and magazines to publish the article. To Sylvia this means the loss of her carefully guarded privacy, and the loss of the illusion of her new life and persona. Sylvia desperately casts around for ways to suppress the story, begging her lawyer to send a cease and desist letter to Mortimer, which in turn triggers worry from the lawyer, and obviously sparks even more interest regarding this secret. As Sylvia has nobody to talk to, as her partner of several decades Lola, is away for a little while, she resorts to writing her memories and thoughts in notebooks, and it’s these diaries which are the bulk of the story, told from Sylvia’s/Iris’ perspective.







Here is where the slow, carefully crafted writing begins to cause the conflicted feelings in me, because I love how Sarai Walker uses language to paint a very real picture of an oppressive childhood, and a house dominated by mental illness and misogyny, in which 6 young women are raised. Again, the language is carefully crafted so that we can see, and feel, the misogyny of the time period so clearly. Chapel girls are raised to marry and have children, to look after their husbands, nothing more. The 2 oldest sisters, Aster and Rosalind, being permitted to enter further education - which will end immediately upon their marriages - only at 1 specific college, which also teaches women how to run their future husband’s household. This is the bleak ‘future’ awaiting all 6 girls. No matter their ambitions or interests, a desire to study abroad, or a talent for art, all dismissed because the only value of a woman in this narrow world is in her uterus and what it may produce, and how well that product reflects upon her husband and family. Sexuality isn’t even something that was acknowledged, never mind understood and accepted. The variety of personalities in the sister group isn’t something that was in anyway acknowledged or nurtured. The mental illness that they faced was from their distant mother, Belinda. An ethereal creature, Belinda had obviously suffered trauma at some point in her life. That trauma seems to revolve around similar themes, motherhood, lack of options and a complete absence of autonomy in her life, culminating in repeated ‘marital’ rape and forced pregnancies, with most of the pregnancies leaving her weaker and weaker until she finally cannot cope anymore. Trauma is another overarching theme of this book. It seems to touch all the other women in some way, this creeping, pervasive and secretive ‘thing’ that they always need to deal with, alone…i.e without bothering the menfolk with it!

I won’t spoil the plot or the ending for you anymore than I already have, but I hope that I have managed to convey some of the atmosphere for you to use to decide if this one is for you. I honestly have no clue if I would recommend it or not. I think that if you’re one for a slow burn story, and you like atmospheric and lyrical books then this one is for you. If you need a faster pace, one with a little more action and adventure, then maybe save this for a day of personal reflection, or when you just need a good cry!



Well, that’s the review for The Cherry Robbers, will you give it a try or does it not sound like something you’d bother picking up? I’m trying desperately to expand my reading horizons, but I’m in my 40’s now so I don’t see the need to search for new books to read when I have so many wonderful books (and thousands of unread books on my Kindle!) to read books that I may not even enjoy! That logic did not compute for me! So, I may try a few more books that are outside my usual selection criterion throughout June, and I may review them here, I shall decide later.

It's one of those multilayered book that you read and will find different things according to your culture, mood, or whatever.
I noticed that I found hard to classify it because it could be a gothic thriller, a metaphor of female sexual oppression in the 50s, the story of a reclusive female painter who used to be one of the six female daughters of a wealthy family.
I think this is a clue of how complex and nuanced this book is. It's very slow paced but it's a page turner.
I loved the characters but I found the male characters flat.
I loved some partes and was bored by others.
I had a complex relationship but I think it's a recommended book.
Recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine

This book had several gothic elements and feminist themes which I thought would be enough to keep me entertained and hooked. Unfortunately it didn't quite do that. I found the pacing slow. I didn't find it to be exactly gothic either, just with some gothic elements. It had plenty of suspense, but somehow it just wasn't rousing enough for me. This is for someone who likes a detailed, atmospheric writing where connecting to the characters is not much of a requirement. The writing was decent but sadly I didn't connect with it, or any of the characters.

The gothic death aspect of this novel was a struggle for me (it’s probably not my genre and, rather prosaically, I wanted to know why the things were happening with more explanations than was given). However, I got past that and immersed myself in the atmospheric storytelling. I loved the art parts and the feminism and I was compelled to keep reading right to the spooky end. I

The Cherry Robbers is a wonderfully atmospheric, propulsive novel about sisterhood, mortality and forging one's own path….. My Novel Addiction! Wow. This is just my kind of book!… A brace yourself and buckle up read!

4.5 stars. haunting, gorgeous and heartbreaking. i absolutely loved this book. it did remind me at times of “virgin suicides” and “seven husbands of evelyn hugo”, both of which are my absolute favourites, and seeing shades of those two in this book made me enjoy it even more. i especially loved the writing, certain lines just stunned me in awe at their beauty. i also really enjoyed the ambuigity that’s presented within the book - certain things don’t really get an answer and i was fine with that since it only added an additional layer of intrigue/mystery to the story. can’t wait till it comes out so i can grab myself a physical copy.


many thanks to netgalley and the publishers for supplying me with an arc in exchange for my honest review.

An utterly beautiful read. Highly recommend, it's has stayed with me for days, so well written and plotted. A hauntingly atmospheric and gothic read. A haunting read about sisterhood and the imprint tragedy places on one's life. Wonderful.

I really enjoyed this book, well written with a compelling sotyrline and characters that were really well developed. It was gothic and atmospheric and I couldn't put it down.