Korede is a nurse in Nigeria, dedicated to her patients and well-respected by her superiors. But no matter what her achievements are, she knows she'll always play second fiddle to her younger sister, Ayoola. Ayoola is the pretty one, the favorite—and she's a psychotic murderer.
One night Ayoola summons Korede to her boyfriend's house. Ayoola says he attacked her and in self-defense, she stabbed him. It doesn't matter what the facts really are—who would disbelieve Ayoola? Korede is the sensible one, the calm one, the logical one who takes charge of the situation. She knows how to clean up the blood so no traces are found. She knows how to get rid of the body. It seems she has had a great deal of practice with this sort of thing, since this is the third boyfriend Ayoola has killed.
"Femi makes three, you know. Three and they label you a serial killer."
Ayoola isn't the slightest bit remorseful about what happened. She's ready to move on, find another man to charm. Korede thinks she should lie low for a while, even though she knows it won't be long before Ayoola bats her eyes and more men will come running. But this time Ayoola sets her sights a bit closer to home, as she alights on Tade, a handsome, kind doctor Korede works with. He's also the doctor that Korede has been secretly in love with, but she knows she's no match for Ayoola's charms.
As Korede watches Ayoola ensnare Tade, she feels powerless and frustrated. What she wants more than anything is just to reveal her sister's nefarious side, but she knows Ayoola will turn the evidence against her. She wishes she could just escape this life, but she has an obligation to protect her sister. With no one to turn to, she vents her anger and fears to the only person who will listen—a patient who has been in a comatose state for years. But she knows all too well what will happen if she doesn't stop it.
"I am the older sister—I am responsible for Ayoola. That's how it has always been. Ayoola would break a glass, and I would receive the blame for giving her the drink. Ayoola would fail a class, and I would be blamed for not coaching her. Ayoola would take an apple and leave the store without paying for it, and I would be blamed for letting her get hungry."
My Sister, the Serial Killer is a darkly funny yet disturbing story of familial obligation. It packs a powerful punch for a book that is less than 300 pages long, and that is because Oyinkan Braithwaite has created two complex, fascinating, not necessarily likable characters. You get glimpses of family history in order to understand where Ayoola developed her murderous tendencies. You both feel for Korede and want to shake her for allowing herself to be so fully manipulated.
More than that, however, you'll want to know how this book ends. I had lots of suspicions and wasn't disappointed where Braithwaite took her story. It's certainly a troubling book about a woman so fully overshadowed by her sister that she's forced down a path she never would have taken, but it's also commentary on how unfairly women are compared to one another, with the most attractive one almost always winning out.
I really enjoyed this, and read the entire book in a day. It certainly is a bit farcical, yet at the same time, you could believe this actually might happen, particularly in a society that treats women as second-class citizens. Braithwaite's storytelling was dead-on (no pun intended), and I look forward to seeing what comes next for her career.
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