What do you think?
Rate this book
Onzichtbare zusjes
When Jessica Handler was eight years old, her younger sister Susie was diagnosed with leukemia. To any family, the diagnosis would have been upending, but to the Handlers, whose youngest daughter Sarah had been born with a rare congenital blood disorder, it was an unimaginable verdict. By the time Jessica Handler turned nine, she had begun to introduce herself as the “well sibling;” and her family had begun to come apart.
Invisible Sisters is Handler’s powerfully told story of coming of age—as the daughter of progressive Jewish parents who move south to participate in the social-justice movement of the 1960s; as a healthy sister living in the shadow of her siblings’ illness; and as a young woman struggling to step out of the shadow of her sisters’ deaths, to find and redefine herself anew. With keen-eyed sensitivity, Handler’s brave account explores family love and loss, and what it takes not just to survive, but to keep living.
256 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2009
12 people are currently reading
383 people want to read
About the author
Jessica Handler
8 books122 followersJessica Handler is the author of the novel The Magnetic Girl, winner of the 2020 Southern Book Prize and a nominee for the Townsend Prize for Fiction, a 2019 “Books All Georgians Should Read,” an Indie Next pick, Wall Street Journal Spring 2019 pick, Bitter Southerner Summer 2019 pick, and a Southern Independent Bookseller’s Association “Okra Pick.” Her memoir Invisible Sisters was also named one of the “Books All Georgians Should Read,” and her craft guide Braving the Fire: A Guide to Writing About Grief and Loss was praised by Vanity Fair magazine. Her writing has appeared on NPR, in Tin House, Drunken Boat, Full Grown People, Oldster, The Bitter Southerner, Electric Literature, Brevity, Creative Nonfiction, Newsweek, The Washington Post and elsewhere. Honors include the Ferrol Sams, Jr. Distinguished Writer in Residence at Mercer University in Macon, Georgia and the Kenyon Review Peter Taylor Fellowship. She is a visiting faculty member at West Virginia Wesleyan College’s low-residency MFA, and member of the faculty at Etowah Valley MFA at Reinhardt College. Her novel, The World To See, is forthcoming from Regal House Press. Jessica lives in Atlanta with her husband, novelist Mickey Dubrow.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 47 reviews
December 5, 2013
When I received the ARC of Jessica Handler's memoir about losing both her sisters to blood disorders, I was expecting a technical and/or depressing story. How could it not be? Not only did she lose her sisters, but her family unraveled. Handler's father descended into madness, while she disconnected from her family and moved to LA to get away from the stigma of being the "well sibling." So, yes, there is sadness here, but Handler has a knack for finding humor and grace in such heartbreaking circumstances.
The narrative moves back and forth in time, as Handler recalls little slices of her life and mines her own meticulously kept journals to tell this story. Handler's Jewish, progressive household -- where the kids were treated like adults, allowed to make their own decisions (and face the consequences) and not hovered over by their parents -- is recreated in these pages with great insight and love. Those who grew up in the late 60 and 70s will recognize the easier way of life before helicopter parenting took hold.
Ultimately, this is Handler's story as much as it is her sisters. Running away and working in television production in LA and the fast lifestyle of easy sex and drugs are not glossed over, nor is an abortion and a decision later in life not to have children with her husband for fear of passing on the genetic anomaly that killed her sisters. Susie and Sarah are always present, gently guiding Handler along to tell her story and theirs. This is a fitting memorial and a portrait of strength under pressure many of us can only imagine.
The narrative moves back and forth in time, as Handler recalls little slices of her life and mines her own meticulously kept journals to tell this story. Handler's Jewish, progressive household -- where the kids were treated like adults, allowed to make their own decisions (and face the consequences) and not hovered over by their parents -- is recreated in these pages with great insight and love. Those who grew up in the late 60 and 70s will recognize the easier way of life before helicopter parenting took hold.
Ultimately, this is Handler's story as much as it is her sisters. Running away and working in television production in LA and the fast lifestyle of easy sex and drugs are not glossed over, nor is an abortion and a decision later in life not to have children with her husband for fear of passing on the genetic anomaly that killed her sisters. Susie and Sarah are always present, gently guiding Handler along to tell her story and theirs. This is a fitting memorial and a portrait of strength under pressure many of us can only imagine.
November 9, 2021
Jessica Handler's writing is so artful, so artless, so bone-honest and searching that by the end of the book I imagined she and I were very good friends. This is the kind of book that explores loss and family without blinders on, but also with compassion and great love. Although it may sound like a downer to read a book about the loss of two sisters and how the experience broke apart a family and deeply wounded the life of the author, it is a pleasure to be in this loving company through the journey. Handler is a survivor who takes us to a place where we can live in the company of death without losing our courage and our connection. She cracks open the world's deepest places for us, opens the crack wider, and helps us peer into the abyss. A fine debut by a new memoir writer. I hope we will hear more from her soon.
June 13, 2009
This memoir covers a lot of ground in an alinear way that brings to mind the unruly nature of memory itself. It's a quick read, too, despite the heavy themes & rowdy structure -- probably because Handler's poetic ear for description and metaphor is so enticing. Surprisingly undepressing and hopeful.
May 27, 2009
I loved reading this book. It kept me up until after midnight and moved me to sympathetic tears on more than one occasion. After being totally immersed in Jessica Handler's world, I feel like Susie and Sarah have become--in the inexplicable way of good literature--my invisible sisters as well.
December 12, 2022
I thought this would be a sad book and at times it was. But it was so much more than a story about a woman who had two sisters die from a genetic illness. The author explores how her sister's illnesses effected the family and herself and as much as possible, how it effected the sisters that were sick. It is also a coming of age story about herself and how it effected her relationships with her parents, friends, and spouse. I thought it was a really interesting story.
December 4, 2020
Not much written about the impact of sibling loss. This memoir is a terrific addition to grief literature.
Read
September 18, 2009This is Jessica Handler's cathartic personal journey as her family is torn apart by the sickness and ultimately the deaths of her two younger sisters, Susie and Sarah, who were stricken by a gazillion-to-one chance with "diametrically opposed illnesses"—leukaemia and Kostmann's Syndrome (it's a white blood cell deficit). Jessica battles her way out of a shredded childhood and emerges as a passionate, energetic and wise adult—well able to hide the scars of her early years, unable (I suspect) ever to completely heal.
This book was the talk of the summer in our house. My grandmother and I both read it and also shared it with a friend whose husband recently died of leukaemia. We all found it very moving and brutally, brutally honest.
But it's impossible for me to review it objectively. Sarah—Jessica's youngest sister, the one with Kostmann's, who died at 27—was one of my four best friends during my first year in high school. She moved a bit further away and changed schools after I'd known her for a year, so we never developed into proper "Best Friends," but she remained right up there at the top of my dearly beloveds until I went to college and inevitably drifted into a new circle. We stayed in touch. Thirty years later I keep contact all the other girls I hung out with that first year in high school, and with Sarah's mother. And we did it all before Facebook, too, so ner. 1979 was an excellent year for friends.
I confess that I read this book looking for Sarah, hoping it would magically bring Sarah to life for me. Everything that happens in a book really does exist while you're reading it; a book gives a kind of immortality even to fictional events. And I did find Sarah, but only in tantalizing, fleeting glimpses. Because of course Jessica's memoir is actually, but not surprisingly, the story of Jessica. Curious bursts of recognition exploded here and there: a pet cat of Sarah's that I'd known, a photograph of Susie that I'd seen, Sarah's own face gazing out of blurred prints. The weird story of Sarah's miscarriage, which I'd forgotten. The paint job she did on her car. And Jessica just nails Sarah's goofy, irreverent character every time she quotes her. Feeding breadcrusts to the seagulls: "You know, they will explode if they eat an alka-seltzer."
But ultimately, I came away with a portrait of Sarah's sister rather than Sarah. And this is a good thing, because, bizarrely, I have never met Jessica. She was getting on with her own life, in her first year at university 3000 miles away on the opposite coast, the year I met Sarah. And our paths never crossed. Jessica's honest, frank, painful memoir has tied together for me the loose threads that I never quite understood about Sarah's life and her family.
I want to say thank you.
This book was the talk of the summer in our house. My grandmother and I both read it and also shared it with a friend whose husband recently died of leukaemia. We all found it very moving and brutally, brutally honest.
But it's impossible for me to review it objectively. Sarah—Jessica's youngest sister, the one with Kostmann's, who died at 27—was one of my four best friends during my first year in high school. She moved a bit further away and changed schools after I'd known her for a year, so we never developed into proper "Best Friends," but she remained right up there at the top of my dearly beloveds until I went to college and inevitably drifted into a new circle. We stayed in touch. Thirty years later I keep contact all the other girls I hung out with that first year in high school, and with Sarah's mother. And we did it all before Facebook, too, so ner. 1979 was an excellent year for friends.
I confess that I read this book looking for Sarah, hoping it would magically bring Sarah to life for me. Everything that happens in a book really does exist while you're reading it; a book gives a kind of immortality even to fictional events. And I did find Sarah, but only in tantalizing, fleeting glimpses. Because of course Jessica's memoir is actually, but not surprisingly, the story of Jessica. Curious bursts of recognition exploded here and there: a pet cat of Sarah's that I'd known, a photograph of Susie that I'd seen, Sarah's own face gazing out of blurred prints. The weird story of Sarah's miscarriage, which I'd forgotten. The paint job she did on her car. And Jessica just nails Sarah's goofy, irreverent character every time she quotes her. Feeding breadcrusts to the seagulls: "You know, they will explode if they eat an alka-seltzer."
But ultimately, I came away with a portrait of Sarah's sister rather than Sarah. And this is a good thing, because, bizarrely, I have never met Jessica. She was getting on with her own life, in her first year at university 3000 miles away on the opposite coast, the year I met Sarah. And our paths never crossed. Jessica's honest, frank, painful memoir has tied together for me the loose threads that I never quite understood about Sarah's life and her family.
I want to say thank you.
October 6, 2009
The loss of a loved one can wreak havoc on the closest of families. There doesn’t seem to be a formula that can predict which families will survive a tragedy and which families will break apart as a result. In her painfully honest and touching memoir, Invisible Sisters, Jessica Handler revisits the heartbreaking losses of not one, but two of her sisters: Susie (from leukemia at age eight) and Sarah (from a rare blood disorder in early adulthood).
Survivors’ guilt is a term that describes the feeling that arises when one pulls through an unimaginable situation while others do not. Whether it be victims of genocide, natural or man-made disasters, or plane crashes, the survivors are left to ponder “why them and not me?” Handler writes about the burden she carried of being the “well sibling” in a family that slowly foundered under the weight of sorrow and tragedy.
She describes her father, a union lawyer and activist who found it easier to help those less fortunate, but was helpless when it came to rescuing his own family. Her mother’s focus was to keep moving forward and hold the family together at any cost: chairing the PTA, saving newspapers for fundraising drives, and chauffeuring Jessica to piano, clarinet, and ballet lessons all the while navigating an endless round of doctor’s appointments. After Susie is hospitalized (again), she writes about the death of her parents’ marriage in spare but moving terms: “That night while I slept, my parents began the slow and terrible turning away from one another that erodes families facing the death of a child. My father became heart. My mother became mind.”
By the end of Invisible Sisters Handler has journeyed back into the past to revisit the journals she kept as a teenager and has also gained access to the voluminous medical records that charted the course of her sisters’ illnesses. Her bravery in revisiting her family’s story and her decision to choose life over the memories and images of the past that continue to haunt her to this day is inspiring.
Review by Gita Tewari
Survivors’ guilt is a term that describes the feeling that arises when one pulls through an unimaginable situation while others do not. Whether it be victims of genocide, natural or man-made disasters, or plane crashes, the survivors are left to ponder “why them and not me?” Handler writes about the burden she carried of being the “well sibling” in a family that slowly foundered under the weight of sorrow and tragedy.
She describes her father, a union lawyer and activist who found it easier to help those less fortunate, but was helpless when it came to rescuing his own family. Her mother’s focus was to keep moving forward and hold the family together at any cost: chairing the PTA, saving newspapers for fundraising drives, and chauffeuring Jessica to piano, clarinet, and ballet lessons all the while navigating an endless round of doctor’s appointments. After Susie is hospitalized (again), she writes about the death of her parents’ marriage in spare but moving terms: “That night while I slept, my parents began the slow and terrible turning away from one another that erodes families facing the death of a child. My father became heart. My mother became mind.”
By the end of Invisible Sisters Handler has journeyed back into the past to revisit the journals she kept as a teenager and has also gained access to the voluminous medical records that charted the course of her sisters’ illnesses. Her bravery in revisiting her family’s story and her decision to choose life over the memories and images of the past that continue to haunt her to this day is inspiring.
Review by Gita Tewari
August 23, 2017
A beautiful, elegantly understated and emotionally powerful book about the effects of growing up with two sisters with terminal illness. The elegance and the understatement remind me of Joan Didion, and Atlanta Magazine’s comparison of this book to The Year of Magical Thinking is apt. The narrator’s father and her relationship with him are especially fascinating and nuanced. I’ll quote one of my favorite passages, which gives a flavor for the writing and which also shows what it’s like to grow up in a family situation so strange that it seems to define you (which rings true for me, given my own strange childhood). The narrator is on a first date:
“Tell me about about where you grew up, what it was like.”
Here’s where he gets up and runs, I thought, taking a sip of my beer. “I am the oldest of three girls, and I am the only one still alive,” I said, beginning the story pried out of me with every new friendship and every date.
I had learned to watch my listener’s reactions while I told my story. Did my date look away from me and scrutinize the dusty plastic St. Pauli Girl sign over the bar? Would he tell me that he knew an old lady once who “caught cancer” or that he understood how I felt because his dog had died?
How a potential lover reacted to my story predicted the way he would behave toward me. Talking about death is like admitting you have wet yourself. Death is embarrassing, a failure. Death is indecent. My being acquainted with the aftermath of death, especially the deaths of a child and a young woman, made me somewhat of a Cassandra.
I have read that because so few people have been to the moon, astronauts have found that they can fully connect emotionally only with other astronauts. When I finished telling my tale at the bar, the man who would become my husband looked me in the eye. Each of us recognized that we had been to the moon.”
“Talking about death is like admitting you have wet yourself.” Yes! This is an example of Handler dark humor, which makes the book both entertaining deeply, deeply affecting.
“Tell me about about where you grew up, what it was like.”
Here’s where he gets up and runs, I thought, taking a sip of my beer. “I am the oldest of three girls, and I am the only one still alive,” I said, beginning the story pried out of me with every new friendship and every date.
I had learned to watch my listener’s reactions while I told my story. Did my date look away from me and scrutinize the dusty plastic St. Pauli Girl sign over the bar? Would he tell me that he knew an old lady once who “caught cancer” or that he understood how I felt because his dog had died?
How a potential lover reacted to my story predicted the way he would behave toward me. Talking about death is like admitting you have wet yourself. Death is embarrassing, a failure. Death is indecent. My being acquainted with the aftermath of death, especially the deaths of a child and a young woman, made me somewhat of a Cassandra.
I have read that because so few people have been to the moon, astronauts have found that they can fully connect emotionally only with other astronauts. When I finished telling my tale at the bar, the man who would become my husband looked me in the eye. Each of us recognized that we had been to the moon.”
“Talking about death is like admitting you have wet yourself.” Yes! This is an example of Handler dark humor, which makes the book both entertaining deeply, deeply affecting.
September 19, 2015
Having just read a host of memoirs about loss, grief, illness, strong mothers, tormented fathers who fall apart during hard times and excruciating circumstances Invisible Sisters stands out as being one of the best. Jessica Handler's memoir about the death of her two sisters, and the disintegration of her family, especially her father is searing and honest and matter-of-fact and I inhaled this book over the course of a day.
Like many families the Handlers did not talk about the death of their daughter, Susie who died at age 8 from Leukemia. Since the time that Susie was diagnosed her parents managed this life-altering fact in opposite ways and after her death her "parents began the slow and terrible turning away from one another that erodes families facing the death of a child." Very soon after her father mentally and psychically fell apart and the family that Jessica knew was gone. For Jessica, the "well" daughter, there was expectations to meet and hopes to fulfill, conflicts to mediate between parents and the need to protect; her other sister, her mother and mostly herself. Lost, without much support she left home early, bereft and alone with death as her companion.
I understand all of this. As someone who grew up with the specter of death shadowing my family there is no way out of it terrorizing you. So you can tentatively try to make friends with it, you can accept that you will be frighted and sickened and devastated by fear, be immobilized by it, live life as fully as possible, forget about it and do all of this at once. This is what I treasure about Jessica's smart and gracious book. She comes to know this and as she worked to save herself, with the support and love of her mother, husband and community of people around her, she hands herself back a life full of meaning and peace.
Thank you NetGalley for allowing me to review this book for an honest opinion.
Like many families the Handlers did not talk about the death of their daughter, Susie who died at age 8 from Leukemia. Since the time that Susie was diagnosed her parents managed this life-altering fact in opposite ways and after her death her "parents began the slow and terrible turning away from one another that erodes families facing the death of a child." Very soon after her father mentally and psychically fell apart and the family that Jessica knew was gone. For Jessica, the "well" daughter, there was expectations to meet and hopes to fulfill, conflicts to mediate between parents and the need to protect; her other sister, her mother and mostly herself. Lost, without much support she left home early, bereft and alone with death as her companion.
I understand all of this. As someone who grew up with the specter of death shadowing my family there is no way out of it terrorizing you. So you can tentatively try to make friends with it, you can accept that you will be frighted and sickened and devastated by fear, be immobilized by it, live life as fully as possible, forget about it and do all of this at once. This is what I treasure about Jessica's smart and gracious book. She comes to know this and as she worked to save herself, with the support and love of her mother, husband and community of people around her, she hands herself back a life full of meaning and peace.
Thank you NetGalley for allowing me to review this book for an honest opinion.
February 17, 2017
Handler's writing style really resonates with me. I read a lot of memoirs and books dealing with grief, and the author's life story demonstrates exactly how NOT to deal with the loss of a child in a family. It broke my heart that her parents made no effort to make sure there was a headstone for the daughter who died when she was eight years old. I can't help but think that the family would have done better if they had something to hang onto in those ensuing years as they faced the death of another daughter. A faith, perhaps? Or even each other? I would hate to think that how Handler ended up dealing (or not dealing) with the loss of her sister is how even a small percentage of young people would handle the loss of a sibling; drugs and indiscriminate sex...
A heartbreaking story.
A heartbreaking story.
May 15, 2017
Great book! Good story of families, love and loss. I am going to recommend this one for our book discussion series.
December 7, 2020
This would be a great book club choice --so much to discuss about this tragic and charismatic family packed into a quick read.
I was worried that this memoir might be too depressing, but Handler brings humor, insight, and fascinating situations for the reader to 'come up for air' in between the heartbreak. This book is at the same time very specific (e.g. the unique medical situation with the sisters' illnesses, the complex ways one family tried to live with two impending deaths, the 20th century American middle class cultural response to death,) while also being relatably universal (e.g. family love and dysfunction, a young woman's coming of age).
I was worried that this memoir might be too depressing, but Handler brings humor, insight, and fascinating situations for the reader to 'come up for air' in between the heartbreak. This book is at the same time very specific (e.g. the unique medical situation with the sisters' illnesses, the complex ways one family tried to live with two impending deaths, the 20th century American middle class cultural response to death,) while also being relatably universal (e.g. family love and dysfunction, a young woman's coming of age).
June 30, 2025
I took a class with Jessica Handler once, on "Writing the Tough Stuff," and was eagerly anticipating reading her memoir when I bought a copy of it. A sad story, of a life lived in the shadow of two deceased younger sisters and a family that exploded under the pressure thereof. An uplifting story, of Handler's successful search to live a life of her own, despite the tragedies underlying it.
I'm giving it "only" four stars because I wasn't spellbound -- something distracted me a bit from truly immersing myself in the story, perhaps the structural decisions the author made, how she moved around in time.
I'm giving it "only" four stars because I wasn't spellbound -- something distracted me a bit from truly immersing myself in the story, perhaps the structural decisions the author made, how she moved around in time.
October 7, 2024
The Handler family suffered unimaginable losses, both as a unit and individually. As the well child, Ms. Handler stands back as the observer as her sisters fall ill, her parents fall apart, and lives are rebuilt, with varying levels of success. She's a skilled storyteller, assisted by her family's tendency to squirrel away even the smallest mementos and to keep detailed diaries.
November 5, 2023
It was a bit scattered in the telling though makes sense on the whole. Gathering parts of life and loss is not linear. It really felt like Jessica had opened the door and let me in. She put the pieces together.
February 5, 2018
Moving, heartfelt and honest portrayal of losing a sister as a child and then again as a young woman and the toll the griefs took on her family and the lasting repercussions.
April 6, 2024
Zeer mooi geschreven. Een autobiografisch verhaal met veel dramatische gebeurtenissen, maar dat vooral troost uitstraalt.
February 20, 2025
Eye opening and heartbreaking all at once. To know prof handler you would never know the sadness she carries.
March 26, 2025
A very sweet memoir. The love Jessica Handler feels for her sisters is very evident and her guilt over being the "well" sister is compelling.
January 13, 2010
This book was recommended to me by a woman who knew the author. I then saw pieces of a talk the author gave to a group of booksellers and was hooked; I had to read this book. Jessica writes about the loss of her sisters, one as a child, the other as a young adult and the impact it had on her and on her family. She writes with a raw humor and detachment in some places, others attempts to explain the inexplainable, how the family could just -hop- over these losses without sharing the deep pain that they caused each person. I am glad that she took the journey as an adult to look at this, for her and her family, as well as the forgiveness and pause it gave me in my own personal family relationships. For her to long so for the sisters who are not there, while I rap mine that are is no longer possible.
May 1, 2018
On April 4, 2018, Jessica Handler and I discussed Invisible Sisters: A Memoir in front of a live audience at The Wren's Nest. She writes beautifully about what it was like to grow up in Atlanta during the Civil Rights Movement. There's a moving passage in the book about an eight-year-old Jessica and her father attending the funeral for Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Listen to a recording of the interview in Episode 37 of the Literary Atlanta podcast.
September 8, 2015
I think this memoir was very cathartic for the author. By the time she was 10 she had lost one sister to leukemia and her other was diagnosed with a rare blood disorder.
Jessica Handler tells of how her family basically slowly fell apart after the death of her younger sister, Susie, at the age of 8. Invisible Sisters tells her story, the "well sibling," as she called herself. It follows her path through childhood, her college years and into adulthood.
I'm not sure why it didn't strike a cord with me. I think I felt that it was almost written from an observers point of view rather than an actual member of the family even though Ms. Handler did go into her feelings at different points.
This book was provided to me free through Netgalley.com for review purposes.
Jessica Handler tells of how her family basically slowly fell apart after the death of her younger sister, Susie, at the age of 8. Invisible Sisters tells her story, the "well sibling," as she called herself. It follows her path through childhood, her college years and into adulthood.
I'm not sure why it didn't strike a cord with me. I think I felt that it was almost written from an observers point of view rather than an actual member of the family even though Ms. Handler did go into her feelings at different points.
This book was provided to me free through Netgalley.com for review purposes.
August 6, 2010
I knew going in that this book was going be about loss and, well, a bummer. I was so wrong. What happened to Handler's family was profoundly sad but there are so many funny and poignant moments that survive in her storytelling. She's got a laser-like ability to zero in on the truth of a situation and relationships. Her writing is superb, straightforward, and self-revealing without a hint of self-pity. I related to her story more than I thought I would. It sucked me in start to finish. This is one of those books that changes you for the better and makes you want to hug the author and then buy her a beer.
Read
March 22, 2009Jessica Handler's memoir tells her story of being the "well sibling" in a family of 3 daughters, one who dies as a child from leukemia and one who dies as a young adult from a rare blood disease. The toll this takes on her family and her own life is shared through recollections from the many journals Jessica has written and kept through the years. The story is heart wrenching but I found it choppy - some things are briefly mentioned but never fully explained and I was never really able to become fully engaged emotionally in the story.
April 6, 2010
I am not sure why I did not like this book very much. There were parts that I liked and parts I totally skimmed over. Maybe the authors writing style isn't to my liking. When giving stars, I often give three to a book I enjoyed, four to a book I couldn't wait to get a chance to pick up and keep reading and I am keeping five for an ultimate favorite. So, by giving this book two stars, I am not saying it was a bad book. It just seemed too disjointed and didn't draw me in. I read other goodread readers reviews and many like it much better than I did.
May 19, 2010
Handler’s older sister Susie was diagnosed with leukemia at the age of six. Her younger sister Sarah suffers from a rare bone-marrow disorder. Jessica is the healthy one.
This is really a family memoir of survival after tragedy and loss. The writing was a bit stiff at times but Handler’s account of her parents’ marriage and her own grieving is honest and touching without a hint of self-pity. Her story describes an interesting view of the effects of loss on the family.
This is really a family memoir of survival after tragedy and loss. The writing was a bit stiff at times but Handler’s account of her parents’ marriage and her own grieving is honest and touching without a hint of self-pity. Her story describes an interesting view of the effects of loss on the family.
November 29, 2009
A memoir. I had to read it out of sequence to make it through, but found some of the writing really nice.Interesting not only for insights into the devastating impact of disease on a family, but also for the descriptions of place (Atlanta, Boston, LA) time (1970's) and non-religious Jewish family culture.
January 24, 2011
Invisible Sisters is a bracing and lyrical memoir that asks a reader for only as much bravery as he can muster, without judgment or false emotion. In that way the book skillfully evokes author Jessica Handler's experience as a survivor, moving with courage and openness through the deaths of her sisters and her own need to live richly in their honor. Not to be missed.
October 24, 2013
Memorable quotes;
I had only begun to catch brief, clear glimpses of myself. Distractions could easily make me forget how to see inside. Instinct told me to keep my head above water and watch for the shore. I lived alone, looking for myself, for five years.
(227)
You are alive because you are alive. (248)
I had only begun to catch brief, clear glimpses of myself. Distractions could easily make me forget how to see inside. Instinct told me to keep my head above water and watch for the shore. I lived alone, looking for myself, for five years.
(227)
You are alive because you are alive. (248)
Displaying 1 - 30 of 47 reviews