The Sea Sisters

"People go travelling for two reasons: because they are searching for something, or they are running from something."

That quote is an excellent introduction to Lucy Clarke's novel - Swimming at Night.

The opening pages introduce us to Katie - who has just received news that her younger sister Mia is dead. Mia took off six months ago to travel the world. The police say she committed suicide in Bali, but Katie cannot accept that verdict. When the police return Mia's backpack, Katie discovers Mia's travel journal inside. Impulsively, she decides to travel in Mia's footsteps, hoping to find some answers.

Clarke tells the story of these two sisters in alternating chapters. This format consistently grabs me - I always want to read just show more another chapter to see what happens next.

Clarke explores relationships in Swimming at Night - friends and lovers but most significantly - that of the sisters. Each sister remembers their childhood, their growing up years and their relationship as adults. Katie is the sensible, stable sister - Mia is the wild child. With every chapter, Clarke drops a few more hints as to what triggered the rift between the two.

"She hadn't told him about the terrible argument she's had with Mia. She hadn't told him of the hateful, shameful things she'd said. She hadn't told him about the anger and hurt that had been festering between them for months. She hadn't told Ed any of this because there are some currents in a relationship between sisters that are so dark and run so deep, it's better for the people swimming on the surface never to know what's beneath."

Excerpts from Mia's journal exposes even more - lies, secrets, hopes, dreams and - more clues as to what really happened to Mia.

I'm sure Clarke must have a sister - her exploration of this often complicated dynamic rings true. Both of the sister's narratives were equally compelling and well written. Certainly, I stopped more than once to consider my own relationship with my own sister. Clarke is an avid traveller herself and this showed in the lush descriptions of settings of Australia and Bali. Water is used very effectively as a metaphor for many aspects of the sister's relationship.

Definitely a recommended read - and especially for book clubs show less

A very enjoyable read. This book, by a first time author, examines the relationship between 2 sisters, the love, the anger, feelings of inadequacy, and guilt.
The story alternates between Katie and Mia's story. Katie is the elder, more "perfect" sister, while Mia is the wild one. After their mother's death, Mia wants to find out more about herself, and escape the tedium of life in England. She runs to paradise, partying & living out of hostels. When tragedy strikes, Katie follows Mia's travel path, trying to find out what happened to her. During her travels, she learns a lot about herself and the sister, that she thought she knew, but never really did.
I loved how the author was able to nail down and describe the emotional turmoil that show more plays a part in many families. I'm looking forward to Lucy Clarke's next book! show less

I received this as a goodreads first read giveaway..this was a very good book which followed the journey, both physical and emotional of a womam as she followed the same route her sister had followed previously. By the end I really didn't like either of the women much but liked their close friend Finn. I cried several times while reading this book and by the end, I had trouble putting it down.

Swimming at Night by Lucy Clarke is an engrossing story that kept me engaged throughout. It is a story about sisters and their complicated relationship. The novel opens with Kate, the older and more responsible sister, being notified of her sister Mia's suicide in Bali. The news is devastating to Kate as they had recently fought, and Kate blames herself for her sister's death. She does not fully accept that her sister would kill herself, and Bali was never a stop on her itinerary. After receiving her sister's personal belongings, Kate finds Mia's travel journal and decides to work through her grief and find answers to her questions by retracing Mia's journey. She reads one journal entry per day to preserve what is left of her sister. show more The story captivates the reader's attention instantly.

The chapter's alternate between Kate's and Mia's perspectives. I appreciate this format, especially being able to experience the same events from the different points of view of the characters. The novel does not only uncover Mia's final months, but it also is a period of self-discovery for both sisters.

I would have given this book a 5 star rating had it not been the too convenient ending. One character appears in a very crucial scene that just didn't feel authentic to me. The reader definitely needs the information the character provides, but his handy appearance did not resonate with me. This being said, it is still a great read that I highly recommend. show less

This story is about two sisters, rather stereotyped perhaps in that Katie (the older one) likes her life to be organised and structured. She feels almost motherly towards the younger Mia, who is much more spontaneous, untidy, and willing to take risks. The story opens - so this is no spoiler - with Katie receiving the terrible news that Mia has been found dead in Bali, in the middle of a backpacking journey.

When Mia’s backpack is returned, Katie finds her journal and decides to read only a tiny portion at a time, in the hope that she can learn more about her sister by travelling in her footprints...

The majority of the novel is quite cleverly written, alternating between Katie’s viewpoint and experiences as she gives up her job and show more follows where her sister went, and Mia’s own journey that led to her ultimate demise. It could have been rather morbid but manages not to be; it’s a surprisingly lightweight novel, given the subject matter. Katie learns a great deal on her travels although she can’t quite shake off her need for organisation and structure; I’m not sure I quite believed that someone with this personality would take off as she does, and yet somehow it works. Grief, after all, can make people do some strange things. More unlikely, it seemed to me, was her insistence of reading only a small section of her sister’s journal at a time. I don’t think I would have been able to resist reading the whole thing.

The ending was rather predictable; the various ‘revelations’ were obvious by the time they were spelled out, and I didn’t find any of the minor characters at all memorable. But still, it was a pleasant way to occupy several otherwise tedious hours, and I hope to read more by this author in future.

(This novel is also known as 'Swimming at Night' in the US) show less

Katie and Mia are sisters and they are complete opposites. Katie is organised and responsible, while Mia doesn't last 5 minutes in a job and is very highly strung. They have been raised by their mother after their father left when they were very young. After their mother dies of cancer, Mia spontaneously decides to take a trip around the world with her best friend, Finn. Several months later, after only very sporadic contact from Mia, Katie is woken by a knock on the door in the middle of the night. Mia's body has been found at the foot of a cliff in Bali and the authorities have concluded that she committed suicide. Katie's reaction is one of disbelief - Mia wouldn't have done that. In the end, armed with Mia's travel journal, she show more decides to trace Mia's footsteps around the world in an effort to understand what was going through Mia's head and whether Mia killed herself or not.

This is an easy book to read and it's an interesting premise but the story hinges on so many unlikely coincidences and choices and that really undermined it for me. I couldn't imagine anyone behaving like Katie did. Your sister has killed herself on the other side of the world, you can't imagine what was going through her head and you're armed with her travel diary - so wouldn't you read it? Or talk to the friend who was travelling with her? But no, instead of doing any of these things - and despite the fact that she's getting married in four months' time - Katie books a three month trip for herself, deciding to go to all the places that Mia visited and only read the travel diary day by day, when she's in the same place where Mia was as she wrote each entry. So for example she spends a month travelling up and down the West Coast of Australia before even heading to Bali. It just doesn't feel even remotely realistic!

I also felt that the characters were hard to believe. They tended to behave in ways that served the plot rather than ways that real people would behave. Katie and Finn in particular felt quite under-developed to me. There are also lots of back stories between the various characters which will emerge over the course of the book. So what that means is that people withhold information so that it doesn't get revealed too early - Ed in particular does something midway through the book that I think he would actually have done much earlier (I won't explain further but if you've read the book you'll know what I mean).

So in summary, this is a good holiday read, undemanding and reasonably intriguing, with plenty of twists and a mystery that holds out till the end. However I didn't feel that it was in any way a standout. I did however like the descriptions of the places that Mia and Katie travel too - they really came alive for me and made me feel like slinging a backpack on myself!

In the US, this book has been published under the title "Swimming at Night". show less

Katie has just been told that her younger sister, Mia, has been found dead at the bottom of a cliff in Bali and that it has been ruled a suicide. Katie and Mia didn't exactly get along with each other as they got older and they hardly talked to each other since Mia suddenly left on an around-the-world trip six months ago, but Katie doesn't believe that Mia killed herself. After Mia's journal has been returned to her sister in London, Katie decides that the only way to find out the truth is to travel in Mia's footsteps. So Katie leaves her safe, orderly life behind and travels to all the places Mia wrote about in her journal.

The chapters go back and forth between Katie and Mia. The book was nothing special, in fact it was boring and show more mostly forgettable. A few things seemed too convenient. But I wanted to know what happened to Mia. And when I found out I was a little disappointed. What I really enjoyed was travelling - I felt like I was in California, Hawaii, Australia, and Bali. show less