The book is beautifully written. It shows the effects of how mental illness was dealt with the family. It also shows sisterhood, love, and loss. Thanks to the publishers at Grove Press and NetGalley for giving me an opportunity to read this book and do a review.

Shred Sisters sheds light on the complex relationships among siblings and how complicated things become with mental health issues.
The characters were well written and really displayed raw emotion and depth. The story had multiple layers and was very well done. Amy was a great character and I enjoyed reading from her perspective. There were a few moments I really resonated with, having come from complicated family dynamics.


Special thanks to Net Galley and the publisher for allowing me the opportunity to read this ARC. Congratulations and best of luck!

“𝑯𝒂𝒑𝒑𝒊𝒏𝒆𝒔𝒔 𝒊𝒔 𝒂𝒕𝒕𝒂𝒊𝒏𝒂𝒃𝒍𝒆, 𝒔𝒂𝒅𝒏𝒆𝒔𝒔 𝒊𝒔 𝒊𝒏𝒆𝒗𝒊𝒕𝒂𝒃𝒍𝒆.”

Shred Sisters is a beautifully raw coming of age story of how mental illness can touch every facet of a family’s life.

The story revolves around Amy and her family. Through the eyes of Amy we are shown how from a young age her sister Ollie has been different, always taking risks that other children don’t. As Ollie gets older, these risks become significantly more dangerous until she is put into a mental health facility for her bipolar disorder. As the years pass, Amy and her family’s life revolves around Ollie and what she is, or isn’t doing. Amy, despite getting perfect grades, graduating high school and college, getting a job and getting married is still struggling with feeling good enough for her mom and herself. We follow Amy as she struggles with this, and her complete denial of Ollie effecting her life and relationships.

Lerner does a great job on painting a very realistic picture of complicated family dynamics. If you have a family member with mental illness or addiction, this story will definitely interest you and hit very close to home.

Thank you NetGalley, the author and the publisher for an e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I really enjoyed this book. The writing style is relatively simple, but the story has many layers, leaving a lot to reader interpretation. I found it interesting that we see things from Amy’s perspective - rather than Ollie’s - mimicking the confusion her family feels regarding her behaviour. We never really know why Ollie behaves like she does, but we know that Amy’s relationships are directly impacted by her relationship with Ollie. A very clever, absorbing novella.
Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC

Amy grew up and lived in her sister Ollie’s shadow. Despite being an exceptional student and never in trouble, Ollie’s unpredictable and often dangerous behavior always took center-stage. This in turn affected Amy’s relationships with her parents, with romantic partners, with coworkers, and even therapist.

A story about how unchecked mental illness (or defiance against treatment) can affect an entire family unit for years.

I enjoyed this book. I felt frustrated along side Amy in particular interactions with her mother, father and especially Josh (ugh. Josh. I have things to say about him.) I wanted Amy to thrive and feel like she deserved to thrive. If I ever see Courtney it’s on sight. I don’t care if Amy feels like she moved on. On sight.

This was one of those books that I will occasionally consider the characters and wonder how they would be doing now.

4.5 stars - I was totally engaged reading Betsy Lerner's novel Shred Sisters. The book covers family dynamics, mental health, addiction, but at the heart the special relationship of sisters.

Thank you NetGalley for the ARC

Shred Sisters.

Two different characters constructes with an almost antagonistic relationship between them. Olivia Shree and Amy Shred.

Olivia; unbalanced, disorganized, uncontrolled and destructive since her youth. She often runs away from home and the family now has to accept this as a routine. She cannot be get better psychiatrically, too.

Through the novel, Olivia leaves everyone uneasy and uncertain. She is not bothered by this. because Her family has built their entire lives on her imbalances. Meanwhile, Amy is the successful, organized, well-behaved daughter of the family. However, having a family problem like Olivia pushes her to become invisible. In the novel, all the troubles Amy experiences in different periods of her life are woven with the trauma of this inequality.
Amy is passive, like a shadow. Even in ger relationships with men. However, she is a successful scientist.

The novel consists of Amy's narration.
It is a novel about the opposing, and even unequal, relationship established between the two daughters of the family since childhood. This inequality is also the reason why the family broke up and Amy's life cannot escape the effects of trauma.

It is impossible not to empathize with the characters, or more precisely Amy, while reading. The devastation of being left behind in life is great.

I liked the book. Thanks to NetGalley and Publisher for ARC.

Such a deep and moving story. This shows the deep running issues between family, siblings and one's self. It's not a perfect story nor does it include perfect people, it is messy and has damaged bits but I think that's what made this so remarkable for me. The utter rawness of each character, flaws and all. Some may say it's "slow" for the first half for the story, however, I believe it is building the background and deepens the understanding for each of the main characters. As you watch them grow and development, it was truly eye opening. Many heart breaking moments as well. This makes you be more open minded, aware and understanding to those possibly dealing with mental illness, addiction or family problems. I enjoyed it.

I received this ARC from NetGalley and Grove Atlantic to read/review. All of the statements above are my true opinions after fully reading this book.

Writing: 5/5 Plot: 4/5 Characters: 4/5

This novel follows the Shred sisters from childhood to middle adulthood. Our narrator is Amy, the younger, nerdy, physically diminutive, and (apparently) socially challenged sister. Her older sister, Olivia (Ollie), is beautiful, reckless, and rapidly heading for a lifetime of mental illness and instability. Written in the first person (Amy), it reads like a memoir by which I mean that things happen with a real life, rather than narrative, arc. Amy’s journey is a tough one, with the destabilizing influence of her attention-soaking, manic-depressive, more-than-a-handful, older sister on the whole family.

Lerner is an excellent writer -- clear, detailed, and multi-layered. For what could be a very melodramatic story, it is told with a more dispassionate style — full of the “what” of the story without the accompanying hand wringing and / or judgement. Unfortunately for me, it doesn’t detail much of the more reflective “why” which is what interests me more. Why did Amy make so many (IMHO) bad decisions? Did she learn from them and if so, what? I can infer how her family life, her personality, and her destabilizing sister may have contributed to her life decisions, but I would have preferred to hear her own reflections. I found Amy’s life depressing, though it isn’t at all clear that she found it so (which let’s face it is the important thing!). There is a lot of human brokenness in the book, including addiction, infidelity, poor parenting, and general relationship issues — some of which I could relate to, but much I could not.

Overall it was a very good book and never became a chore to read. The characters were well-drawn but I could not understand or relate to them much of the time. I’m always trying to understand why people do what they do — in real life and in novels — and I wish the author had been more deliberate in discussing this.

I absolutely loved this book. . . equally as much as I did “The Bridge Ladies”.
Joy, grief, and sorrow coexist and penetrates our hearts as we follow along with the Shred family.
The “Shred Sisters” examines how mental illness affects everyone in a family … and how easily one family member’s volatile conduct and flightiness can become the families primary focus.
Tension and uncertainty increase over the years for the Shreds. Relationships became emotionally draining and shattering.

Sisters Amy and Olivia, (Ollie) were four years apart in age.
Amy, the youngest narrates the story.
Growing up, Amy could be considered a nerd by her school contemporaries. Math and science came easy to her where social skills did not.
Ollie could charm others like nobody’s business. People naturally gravitated towards her. Her physical beauty, and personality allure were magnetic. However…..Ollie was not well. She showed all the signs of Bipolar disorder before her parents or Amy had any understanding of the disease.
Ollie’s erratic behaviors continued to grow over the years — ( stealing, lying, drugs, running away).
Amy was trying to assert herself - live a morale life - achieve academic excellence- (she had scholarly goals), but she also wanted to feel half the confidence as Ollie seemed to do with no effort at all.
Amy knew she could never enter her sister’s world. Ollie was daring and reckless. She slept naked, while Amy wore pajamas over underpants and undershirts.
They fought, physically, hair pulling, punching, kicking when they were little, but far worse were the name-calling insults. Ollie could always level Amy.

The details - and stories - we follow from childhood into adulthood….are funny, sad, devastating, and hopeful…..often all at the same time.
I found it as interesting learning about Amy and Ollie’s parents ….and many of the supporting characters as I did exploring the relationship between the two sisters.

A small personal share (the much longer story would be another book).
My husband and I have two daughters….four years apart. Our younger daughter, Ali, grew up around Katy’s erratic behaviors as well. Katy was hospitalized five times between the ages of fourteen and eighteen. Our daughter was severely anorexic with borderline personality disorder.
Long story short….
Today, Katy is a professional actress living in West Hollywood ….(also a singer songwriter, dancer, contortionist, piano player, director, and artist). She’s successful and beautiful. My husband and I see her on TV from time to time ….but we haven’t seen her in person in ten years. She doesn’t choose to have contact with anyone in our family. I still hope for a happier-love relationship ending.
Ali is married and lives in Victoria, Canada. Her relationship with my husband and are healthy with expressive love with one another.

“Shred Sisters” was a deeply meaningful book for me (reflective and relatable)
…. I loved the ending….but I also felt those sad/ happy tears during the last third of the novel.

This is a brilliant novel with realistic characters ….realistic situations and challenges. It was hard ‘not’ to care about these characters because they were written with so much truth and tenderness….[thank you Betsy Lerner]
Also….
Hot Damn….there are some ‘funny scenes’ too! Being Jewish, I also enjoyed the familiar feelings too.

Highly recommend….especially to all sisters, Mom’s and

Quite a beautiful story about complex, damaged people. The book is from the perspective of Amy Shred, the younger sister of troubled, beautiful Ollie, and spans their childhood through to early 30s or so.

This isn't one of those books which revolves around one big dramatic event, but rather a number of smaller things happening. The challenges of growing up, trying to find one's way in the world, friendship, sex, love and loss are all covered. I liked Amy as a protagonist, she was well-developed and nuanced.
The novel explores what it is like to have a family member with a mental illness (bipolar disorder) in a way that I think is overall quite sensitive and realistic.

My main criticism would be that at times the story jumped around a bit and didn't follow sequence, cutting to different time periods but in a way that didn't flow that well.

If I had to compare the book to some other authors, I'd say a little Sally Rooney (but more happens in the story), a little Taylor Jenkins Reid (without the fluffiness), and a little Liane Moriarty

This was an interesting read to explore a skewed family dynamic and the impacts it can have on you through your life.