Since my mom is dead, I thought I’d share my first review for Shred Sisters with you all. Yes, I want more pats on the head, gold stars, orchid leis around my neck, more ribbons, trophies, carrots, high fives, rainbows and pots of gold. I’m a middle child and a writer. There is no end to my need for validation and adoration. But you know all this. Indulge me!
[KIRKUS STARRED REVIEW]
The younger of two siblings grows up in the shadow of her beautiful, reckless, mentally ill sister. “Here are the ways I could start this story,” Amy Shred says, offering three choices in a brief prologue to memoirist and literary agent Lerner’s debut novel. “Olivia was breathtaking.” “For a long time, I was convinced that she was responsible for everything that went wrong.” “No one will love you more or hurt you more than a sister.” The engaging, thoughtful voice established here goes on to unfold the story of Amy’s childhood, coming of age, and early adulthood, all profoundly shaped by the wild trajectory of her older sister: a rebel, a runaway, a mental patient, a dropout, a thief, a missing person. Amy herself—called Bunny or Bun in the family—is the classic supersmart miserable outsider, bullied at school, friendless, always bewildered at the utter unfairness of life. What could be a nice normal Connecticut Jewish family is anything but as Amy’s parents are pushed far beyond their ability to cope, and ultimately their ability to stay married. Amy finishes a science major at college in three years and throws herself into graduate work at a lab at Columbia University, zigzags into publishing, finally loses her virginity, meets the man she will marry, and goes into therapy. The story unfolds with the verisimilitude of a memoir: Amy’s nuanced relationships with her mother, her father, and her partners are all utterly convincing and relatable. Her mother, Lorraine, is a particularly fine creation, both a very specific East Coast Jewish type and an archetypal maternal presence. “In the months and years after she died, I often saw the world through her eyes, as if I had inherited her mantle of judgment, her scoreboard in the sky.” Many of us know that feeling exactly.
A seamlessly constructed and absorbing fictional world, full of insight about how families work.
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Betsy Lerner 
I can’t wait to read this! Congrats on the great review.
Congratulations, Betsy! Consider yourself duly patted and high fived! I can imagine reading this for the first time must have had you dancing around the room and maybe even crying with joy. I hope so!
Fabulous review. I can’t wait to read this. Congratulations, Betsy!
wow Betsy!!!! Congratulations! What a great and smart review!
Can’t wait! Great review. So proud and happy for you.
HG
Fantastic review. The ribbons and gold stars accumulate. Congratulations!
Woo Hoo!!! Congratulations, Betsy!!
Nice review. I especially liked the quoted lines from the book — they give a decent representation of your “voice” in the book. The line, “… as if I had inherited her mantle of judgement, her scoreboard in the sky.” is, as the reviewer noted, one many of us can relate to. And it’s a sly nod to unabashed baseball fans (Go Yankees!).
Congratulations!
As mother who raised three daughters, one of whom has mental illness, I have been so eager to read this book. The review has me even more excited.
So incredibly happy for you!! Congratulations.
Huge kudos! I absolutely want to read this!
Phyllis
Congrats, Betsy! The novel sounds wonderful and very you. Can’t wait to read it!
Love,
Rob
HUZZAHHHHHH! Of course it’s brilliant. Can’t wait.
THE coveted Kirkus review – and starred! Hoping you’ll land in Bookmarks as Rave all the way across the board. Kudos to you – ALL the stars!
That’s me above – Donna E.
Phenomenal, and you know you’re our hero. Brava!!
A seamlessly constructed and supersmart review! Really, a starred Kirkus review has always been my Grammy award goal, and so glad to see you got such validation for all the turmoil it took to write and edit this novel!
Wow, Betsy! Phenomenal! Here’s a gold star, high five, a pat on the head, a gold medal, carrots, a pot of gold, and rainbows for you 🥰🖐👑🌺🌺🌺🌺🌺⭐️🥇🏆🍀🏅🌈🥕🥕🥠 from one middle child to another! You ROCK!
you can’t complain. Okay they didn’t nominate you for the Nobel. Next time.
bravo, Betsy!
Mazel tov, Betsy. The review is awesome. Even moreso your writing your, truth, however “true” it is actually. A friend used to tell me to “give it all away.” It seems you have harnessed and revealed the “raw” relationships of one family, thus revealing all to all of us. I can’t wait to read it. Hope it’s on it’s way to being a bestseller.
🥳🎊🥂🎉🎆
Checking today, this review is not yet on Amazon, and I have seen many Kirkus reviews posted there. Perhaps your agent can ask them to get on the stick. Or maybe Kirkus will post it as a matter of course. Although bookstores and Amazon are worse towards one another than owls and crows, I personally put a lot of stock in the personal reviews “normal people” post there if they are well-written and some have convinced me to actually buy the book. So…blog readers one and all – what are you waiting for? (oh yeah, we don’t have the book). T.C. Boyle in his shameless efforts to self-promote his titles posts significant passages from all his books on his website. Perhaps that is taboo with your publisher. Amazon says that, “this item is not eligible for review.” So, they won’t do any from the peanut gallery until the book is actually out. Well…maybe their arm could be twisted, though I doubt it. Perhaps you could post a passage here.
Anyway, the point is for your supporters not to minimize the importance of five stars on an Amazon review, and it doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things how well it’s written – it still counts as a five-star review. And for graders who never gave anyone an A just to prove how tough you are, it’s five stars or stay home.
Best of luck with the book, I’m sure it will be a smashing success.
Looks like you wrote your honest heart out, Betsy. Well done you.
I think the cover is fabulous.