The Half Sister by Sandie Jones

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.