A Review: Sista Sister

The long awaited follow up to I am Not Your Babymother is finally here and phew is it good.
To say that I’ve been sitting here with baited breath would be pretty accurate, we have known for a while that Candice Brathwaite was going to be giving us another piece of herself but just how much and just how good it was going to be? That was the question.

Usually I like to start my reviews with a bit of an introduction, maybe tell you about the meat on the bones and then get into the nitty gritty of whether or not I think a title is worth you time, but today is a new day and I just want to go ahead and say it (again) PHEW! It’s good!

I want to put you out of your misery early, yes. Candice has done it again! Sista Sister broken down into 22 lessons and is a culmination of all of the things our author wishes she was told when she was younger and simply put; it’s clever. It feels as though you are having a chat with one of your very good friends, one who knows the right thing to say. Where Candice’s debut book I Am Not Your BabyMother, may have felt, to some, as though it was for those with kids (a sentiment I don’t wholly agree with) this book is for you! Candice speaks openly and sometimes quite painfully about grief and loss, and her belief in putting things out there and manifesting what you want.

Candice has a way of writing that makes you feel like you’re simultaneously sitting in her living room whilst being front row at her Ted Talk. Her tone is casual but firm and she speaks from the heart in this new piece of work, I have never really taken to the short essay style of writing but when it is penned by a certain Ms Braithwaite, I’ll take it. This book is at times brutal, with Candice having to check herself quite often. It is this kind of style that sets her apart, in my opinion, from others who make it their life’s work to write memoirs.

This is the type of book that enticed me to get my mini Post-it notes out and mark certain paragraphs and chapters so that when I inevitably revisit it, the gems are easy to find. And there are many, I found the writings on grief the most powerful. When Candice talks about her father, his death and her dealing with that, it was almost like rifling through someones insanely well-written diary and stumbling across the most personal of sentiments.
Candice navigates these chapters so well, for how much she has crammed into this book, it’s impressive. Yes, some of the chapters, notably the one on money vs. the one on manifestation, have the potential to contradict each-other slightly but whose brain doesn’t?

I give this book 4 worms out of 5, and I only keep a worm in my pocket because I just know that Candice has sooo much more to give. I await her next masterpiece with eager eyes.