Review: The Flower Sisters

The Flower Sisters by Michelle Collins Anderson
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

RECOMMENDED HIGHLY

I have been reading a lot lately, including old favorites and a number of ARCs. I was a bit unhappy with most of the ARCs lately until I got to this one.

This book was riveting historical fiction. Yes, there really was an explosion that destroyed a nightclub and the surrounding block (in reality, the Bond Dance Hall Explosion). No, it was not in a town called Possum Flats! And no, while the woman who died was a licensed embalmer—the first woman to be such a thing—she was not the woman we came to know.

I could not stop reading this novel, and calling it gripping seems a little cliched, but that is exactly what this book was -gripping. It had twists and turns that I never saw coming, and I loved the book more for that fact.

For those who love truth in their fiction, I highly recommend this book, especially if you like reading about the late 1970s. Learning about the 1920s was also really cool!

If you are intrigued, I would google Bond Dance Hall Explosion -it's worth the extra time.

*ARC supplied by the publisher John Scognamiglio/Kensington, the author, and NetGalley. My sincerest thanks for this wonderful novel.

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SYNOPSIS: "Drawing on the little-known true story of a tragic event that took place in the author’s Missouri hometown at an Ozarks dance hall in 1928, this beautifully written novel, told through twin storylines fifty years apart, explores the unpredictable effect of split-second decisions, small-town tragedy, and the ways family secrets reverberate through generations.

Sure to resonate with fans of Daniel Woodrell, Donna Everhart, Ellen Marie Wiseman, and Jeannette Walls.

At birth, Violet and Rose Flowers were identical, save for a tiny bluish-purple mark gracing Violet’s slender neck. By nineteen, their temperaments distinguish them, as different as the flowers their mother named them for—Violet, wild and outgoing, and Rose, solitary and reserved. Still, they are each other’s world. Then, on a sweltering, terrible August night in 1928, an explosion rocks Lamb’s Dance Hall in Possum Flats, Missouri, engulfing it in flames, leaving one twin among the dozens dead, and her sister’s life forever changed.

Fifty years later, Daisy Flowers is dumped on her grandmother Rose’s doorstep for the summer. A bright, inquisitive fifteen-year-old, Daisy bargains her way into an internship at the local newspaper—where she learns of the mysterious long-ago tragedy and its connection to her family. Rose, now the local funeral home director, grows increasingly alarmed as her impulsive granddaughter delves into Possum Flats’ history, determined to uncover the horrors and heroes of the fiery blast.

For a small town, Possum Flats holds a multitude of big secrets, some guarded by the living, some kept by the dead. And through Rose, Daisy, Dash—a preacher who found his calling that fateful night—and others, those ghosts gradually come into the light, forcing a reckoning at last."