This was the first book that was sent to me by Early Reviewers. I read one of her earlier books, The Year of Fog and loved it. This book was equally as compelling for me. The first thing that struck me was the relationships between sisters, I have a younger sister and although our relationship is somewhat different, we are still extremely close.
The book tells the story of two sisters, Ellie and Lila. Lila was murdered while she was a doctoral student in Mathematics at Stanford. Although the police did not arrest anyone, a book was published by a teacher of Ellie's that named a suspect, the married lover/co-student of Lila's. The book was a source of trouble for Ellie as she had spoken to her professor in confidence and had not realized until he was nearly done with the book that he planned to publish it or had even written anything. Ellie's life is thrown into an immediate tailspin when her sister dies. She knows the perfect sister died and she struggles to really find meaning with her own life. She flits from relationship to relationship, bed to bed and job to job until she falls into a job that suits her well, a coffee buyer. The story incorporates the fine art of tasting coffee and the world of mathematics in a story that in an odd way, makes perfect sense. I would recommend this book whole-heartedly because I think it's a story that has so many levels and just pulls one in further and further until the very last page.
