Sisters - Raina Telgemeier

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Telgemeier, R. (2014). Sisters. New York: Graphix, an imprint of Scholastic. ISBN 9780545540599

PLOT SUMMARY

Two sisters travel in a car with their mother and brother across the country. Sisterhood is a magical bond that cannot be torn apart by anyone… but each other. Traveling is not all that it’s cracked up to be when the sister you are traveling with is annoying to the extreme! Can they manage to survive the trip in one piece?

CRITICAL ANALYSIS

Sisters was an amazing story of two sisters who do not get along at all. They have different hobbies, fashion sense, and temperament. Raina always wanted a sister and this book shows what you get is not always what you ask for. Amara, from a young age, does not act like Raina thinks she should. As they grow older, you see them on opposite ends of almost every topic there is under the sun. One wants Burger King, the other McDonalds. One hates snakes the other loves them and so on. Even though they have very different personalities, their bond is still strong. Towards the end, when the mom reveals the hardship between her and her husband, the sisters come together and put aside some of their differences to connect. Coupled with the snake-wrangling, they end the ride in comfortable peace. This was a great way to show the ups and downs between any sibling relationship.

I loved the way the pages were styled differently. When you are in the present and it is happening right now, the pages have a white boarder. As a memory surfaces, the pages take on a yellowish-green hue. I really loved the way the flashback directly related to what happens next in the present. It showed a full complete picture making the story more realistic

REVIEW EXCERPTS

“Told in then-and-now narratives that are easily discernable in the graphic format, Telgemeier’s tale is laugh-out-loud funny (especially the story about the snake incident) and quietly serious all at once.” – Kirkus Reviews Aug. 26th, 2014

“Raina uses her signature humor and charm in both present-day narrative and perfectly placed flashbacks to tell the story of her relationship with her sister, which unfolds during the course of a road trip from their home in San Francisco to a family reunion in Colorado.” – Goodreads Review

CONNECTIONS 

*Compare your sibling relationship to that of the book. If you are an only child, explain how you think it would look.

*How do you think the kids feel about their parents not getting along? What do you think will happen to them?

*Have you ever had a fight with your sibling? How did you resolve the issue?