ARC provided via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Sam has been in the hospital for eighteen months, her body is shutting down, a welcome escape from the past and the memories that haunt her. Sam and the other patients are starving themselves, attempting to control their lives at any cost. Sam's past may be the cause, but also the cure. Through flashbacks we learn about Jena, Sam's elder sister, confined to a life in hospitals after an attack leaves her brain irreparably damaged. Desperate for the answer, Sam begins her own hunt for the criminal that stole her sister from her, but what she finds is only a dark room full of deceit.

"Once I tell Clive the next part of the story, he'll agree. It's not just that I'm mad, I'm bad too.
Sick to the core."

Ruth Dugdall's My Sister and Other Liars is haunting and realistic; two sisters forever changed by an event that comes to life in the flashbacks Sam shares in therapy. Told entirely from Sam's perspective, her anger at herself, at everyone around her, bleeds from the words as she revisits the awful events that lead to her starvation. Sam is a difficult character, her hostility makes her unlikable, but her true lack of control makes you desperate for her health. She's naive, too youthful for her hardened outlook and her story breaks down those around her. Sam's perspective is narrow, her will to live is slim, but Dugdall's writing shows that those around her care and have compassion. Dugdall breaks down the disease, highlighting the many roads that lead to eating disorders for not just Sam, but the secondary characters she lives in treatment with. She showcases the highs, the lows, and the progress made as Sam faces her disease, her sister's accident, her locked up memory, and the heartbreaking reality of other's sicknesses. The events leading up to her treatment begin as hazy memories, but soon Sam is desperate to reveal her discoveries she made as amateur detective. What starts as a slow read soon takes readers on a fast-paced twisted adventure, as twists and red herrings reveal some, but not all secrets. The ending is a surprise, a chilling unveiling of the real truth that readers will be unable to guess.

"I feel unlocked, like my heart is open and warm, and fluttering out are feelings and thoughts that had been frozen."

My Sister and Other Liars is a horrifying tale, it's achingly painful to read, but it is every bit deserving of the praise it has received. Ruth Dugdall tells a twisted tale of secrets and lies, enticing the reader with a plot that doesn't reveal the truth until the very end. Dark and mysterious, this psychological thriller is hard to put down. It's honest take on eating disorders and the events that psychologically break down Sam makes My Sister and Other Liars a novel I highly recommend. ( )

When I first started reading this I wasn't sure to what to make of it and it kind of rubbed me the wrong way. It opens up with a young girl who is battling anorexia and seems to have been admitted to a mental health hospital for treatment of the condition. My problem though was the author, at first, seemed to have her characters so in love with the disorder it was being described in these 'beautiful', ethereal phrases. I almost stopped reading because it was so difficult to read about these girls starving themselves and having it described like it was the most elegant act one can do.

Thankfully I kept with it and I was glad because I began to understand the reason Dugdall wrote the way she did regarding anorexia is because she was showing the mindset people who have this disorder actually have regarding their mental illness. The psychological aspects she brought up, the reasons the girls have for what they do, the type of treatment they undergo, all of it was described with so much accurate detail it was obvious the author spent a great deal of time trying to get this correct.

In the midst of learning about this disorder and why her main character is suffering you are also treated to a mystery of what happened to her sister and why. Eventually I was able to predict most of what was going to be the answers for the various mysteries that tie together but that didn't take away from the overall story. The conclusion was very poignant and was the best possible way to end this story.

The only part I'm still on the fence about is because Dugdall described how people with anorexia view their disorder I'd be concerned that a teenager who may be leaning towards this idea or in the throes will find encouragement within these characters. I would hope that the disorder's traumatizing side effects might change their mind and thankfully the author doesn't hold back on the debilitating things that can happen to a person's body when they choose to starve themselves.

It was definitely an eye opening experience to read this book and by the end I just wanted to hug Sam to tell her everything was going to be okay. ( )

I have now read several books by this author and the connection between them seems to be the tone, which is very dark. This one partially takes place in a unit for anorexics, that in itself is difficult to read, but the reason for Sam being there is heartbreaking. We know she is there for something she did as well as her anorexia, which was used as a defense, but we don't find out exactly what until the story unfolds. She tells her story to the psychiatrist who is trying to help her get released, and I liked trying to follow the clues in her story to where they lead.

Not too much into psychological novels these days but do enjoy the novelty of this author and her plotlines. Tightly plotted and we'll written, I love all the twists and turns, never quite sure where this is going, but enjoy trying to guess. A foray into the dark side of tortured young people, but at the end there is a glimpse of hope.

ARC from Netgalley. ( )

My first book from Ruth Dugdall and it was absolutely brilliant! Fantastic story-line that kept me hooked the whole way through, spilling out little bits of the plot here and there. I was drawn into the book & felt emotionally attached to the characters, even though to me, I thought it would be hard to relate to the main character, Sam, who suffers from an eating disorder. The issues Dugdall addressed were a little more daring than other books that I have read, but I felt that they were fully researched. The book was a little disturbing, but I found it very addictive and could not put it down. I was drawn in to all aspects of the book and when reading it, everything and everyone around me disappeared; I love a book where I can completely lose myself in it.

It is not often I feel compelled to write a review (my first one here on goodreads... and leave five stars!). ( )