The Murderer's Daughters [Hardcover]

Randy Susan Meyers (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 19, 2010

Lulu and Merry's childhood was never ideal, but on the day before Lulu's tenth birthday their father propels them into a nightmare. He's always hungered for the love of the girls’ self-obsessed mother; after she throws him out, their troubles turn deadly. Lulu had been warned not let her father in, but when he shows up drunk, he's impossible to ignore. He bullies his way past Lulu, who then listens in horror as her parents struggle. She runs for help, but discovers upon her return that he's murdered her mother, stabbed her five-year-old sister, Merry, and tried, unsuccessfully, to kill himself.
Lulu and Merry are effectively orphaned by their mother’s death and father’s imprisonment. The girls’ relatives refuse to care for them and abandon them to a terrifying group home. Even as they plot to be taken in by a well-to-do family, they come to learn they’ll never really belong anywhere or to anyone—that all they have to hold onto is each other.
For thirty years, the sisters try to make sense of what happened. Their imprisoned father is a specter in both their lives, shadowing every choice they make. One spends her life pretending he's dead, while the other feels compelled--by fear, by duty--to keep him close. Both dread the day his attempts to win parole may meet with success.
A beautifully written, compulsively readable debut, The Murderer's Daughters is a testament to the power of family and the ties that bind us together and tear us apart.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This solid novel begins with young Lulu finding her mother dead and her sister wounded at the hands of her alcoholic father, who has failed at killing himself after attacking the family. Meyers traces the following 30 years for Lulu and her sister, Merry, as they are sent to an orphanage, where Lulu turns tough and calculating, searching for a way into an adoptive family. Eventually, Lulu becomes a doctor specializing in the almost old, though her secretiveness about her past causes new rifts to form in her new family. Meanwhile, Merry becomes a victim witness advocate, but her life is stunted; she's dependant on Lulu, drugs and alcohol, and she can't find love because she usually want[s] whoever wants me. In the background, their imprisoned father looms until a crisis that eerily mirrors the past forces Lulu and Merry to confront what happened years ago. Though the novel's sprawling time line and undifferentiated narrative voices—the sisters narrate in rotating first-person chapters—hinder the potential for readers to fall completely into the story, the psychologically complex characters make Meyers's debut a satisfying read. (Jan.)
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Review

“How both sisters live, from the squalor of an orphanage to the empty silences of suburban living, is all too believable and heartbreaking because there is no acceptable answer for how to deal with one's part, as living victim, of a horrible crime” —Sarah Weinman, LA Times 'Knock-Out Debuts'

"Meyers delivers a clear-eyed, insightful story about domestic violence and survivor's guilt in "The Murderer's Daughters." It's an impressively executed novel, disturbing and convincing." —Diane White, Boston Globe

"Dives fearlessly into a tense and emotional story of two sisters anchored to one irreversible act of domestic violence. The narrative's dual narrators, Lulu and her younger sister Merry Zachariah, become innocent casualties when, in a terrifying scene relayed from Lulu's childhood perspective, their father murders their mother. Meyers painstakingly traces their lives to show just how much everyone else pays for that one act of violence.” —Christine Thomas, The Miami Herald

"Beautiful language balms the dark plot" —Daily Candy, Best New Winter Books

“The author delivers unshakable truths at every turn. . . Meyers, in a remarkably assured debut, details how the sisters process their grief in separate but similarly punishing ways." —Christian Toto, The Denver Post

"Much like Janet Fitch's White Oleander or Jacquelyn Mitchard's The Deep End of the Ocean, her book takes readers on an emotional roller-coaster ride. Readers, get out your handkerchief and prepare to care." — Library Journal Review

“As provocative as We Need to Talk About Kevin and as emotional as any Jodi Picoult novel.” —New Zealand Women’s Weekly

“A wonderful and thoughtful, wise novel.” —Annabelle, Germany

"A touching tale that will truly move you." —The Sun, UK

"The Murderer's Daughters is the unforgettable tale of Merry and Lulu, little sisters in sorrow, seared by their father's violence. Their heartbreaking story, which spans thirty years, will bring tears to your eyes...but there is a shining light of hope at the end of the tunnel." —Tatiana de Rosnay, New York Times bestselling author of Sarah's Key

"In her mesmerizing, empathic novel The Murderer's Daughters, Meyers explores the bond between two sisters clinging to each other in the aftermath of their mother's murder and their father's imprisonment...and how their bond is tested by the reappearance of the past. You won't be able to put it down." —Jenna Blum, New York Times bestselling author of Those Who Save Us

"This wonderful, thought-provoking novel took hold of me on page one and never let me go. With lovely prose and an uncanny delicacy for such a horrific and oftentimes unspeakable topic, Randy Susan Meyers brilliantly succeeds in telling the untold story of what happens to the children of murder victims. Alternately told through the eyes of Lulu and Merry, the story spans over 30 years and gives us a rare ?A riveting read. . . Highly recommended." —Beth Hoffman, New York Times bestselling author of Saving CeeCee Honeycutt

"In The Murderer's Daughters Randy Susan Meyers tells the intricate and absorbing story of two sisters, one of whom regards herself as an orphan. I love the sweep of this novel, from childhood to adulthood, from pain to understanding, and how intimately Meyers knows her characters and brings them to life. I finished The Murderer's Daughters with the sense that I had been on the best kind of journey." —Margot Livesey, author of The House on Fortune Street, Winner 2009 L. L. Winship/PEN New England Award

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: St. Martin's Press (January 19, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0312576986
• ISBN-13: 978-0312576981
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 7.1 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (179 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #328,498 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

119 of 125 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Disturbing, December 3, 2009

By 

maximum verbosity (Ohio USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: The Murderer's Daughters (Hardcover)

(What's this?)

I knew this book was going to be one of those that stuck with me long after I finished reading it. It is inconceivable to most that someone could injure or kill their child. Merry & Lulu, the two little girls this story is about not only witness their mothers murder, but one of them is savagely attacked by their own father.

Because of their selfish, abusive father, these two sisters grow up shuffling between foster homes & relatives as well as living in constant fear that their father will be released from prison. Lulu feels terribly guilty for her mothers murder and feeling like she didn't protect her sister from her father, while Merry is confused about her feelings towards her father, which aren't what she or anyone would expect considering what he has done.

I absolutely LOVED this book - but not in a "warm fuzzy" way. More in a "I cannot get over this" sort of way. There were some parts of it where I could feel my pulse quicken because I got so into it, it's THAT good.

57 of 58 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Child's Past Lives On In The Adult's Life..., December 10, 2009

By 

delicateflower152 (Texas) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: The Murderer's Daughters (Hardcover)

(What's this?)

Violence impacts a child's life and continues, in the future, to haunt that child. Whether a child feels responsible for causing the violence or for failing to prevent it, every action and reaction they experience is colored by that past. Randy Susan Meyers has written an emotionally powerful novel about two sisters - Lulu and Merry - who have both experienced the effects of domestic violence. After convincing Lulu to allow him to enter the apartment, their father murders their mother and attempts to kill Merry, the younger sister.

Spanning a 32-year period, "The Murderer's Daughters" follows the two girls' lives through a trying childhood into middle age as each eventually faces and overcomes the past. Lulu deals with her demons by compartmentalizing the trauma and denying the past in order to function in the present. She relies on her own inner strength and her intelligence to become a successful doctor. With the exception of Merry, Lulu allows only one individual, her husband Drew, to learn the truth and to see behind the façade she has created. Merry, convinced that their father needs family, accompanies her grandmother and visits the prison every other week as a child; she continues the contact even after her grandmother's death. Unable to trust a man, Merry moves from one superficial sexual relationship to another; her affair with a married man remains the one constant, yet unfulfilling, relationship. Even her professional life is governed by her past - Merry has become a parole officer and seeks ways to rehabilitate, to "save," her parolees. A hostage crisis, involving Lulu's daughters and taking place in Merry's office, finally forces both women to confront their past and to move forward. Lulu realizes she cannot erase the past, but does not have to allow it to control her future; Merry realizes she did nothing to provoke her father's attack and that she must "save" herself before she can save others.

In "The Murder's Daughters," Meyers has created well-developed, complex, and believable characters. The psychological impact of domestic violence affects both Lulu's and Merry's reaction to situations and to people; it is extremely realistic. If you have been or if you know someone affected by domestic violence, you will recognize the two protagonists.

Other individuals, their mother, grandmothers, foster parents, father, and Lulu's family have distinct personalities and add to the novel's depth. Using first person narration and switching between the two sisters' voices provides the reader with two differing perspectives on the book's theme and the story.

If you are looking for a book that will affect your emotions and make you care about the characters, this is one for you. It is a story that will haunt you after you have finished reading the book. It is a story in which the victims of violence are courageous survivors who eventually conquer their past. In the end, it is a story about the triumph of the human spirit.

33 of 35 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A wonderful book, A sad story!, December 13, 2009

By 

P. M. Ayers "scrumpa" (Midwest USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Murderer's Daughters (Hardcover)

(What's this?)

This novel about two sisters, Merry and LuLu who experienced the murder of their mother by their father when they were young children and how this affected their relationship, relationships and their entire lives is a real "can't put it down, page turner. It tells the story of abandonment, life, so-called, in an orphanage, struggle for survival and love, and finally acceptance and relief from painful memories. I highly recommend this book. In fact, although this is a very sad story, it has redemption and hope as its backbone. Read this book you will love it.