The Sisters Brothers

The Sisters Brothers

By

Patrick DeWitt

Sometimes, reading a book is just like listening to someone telling you a story. Someone who has skill in story telling - they have warmth, humour and know how to pace it. With these books, reading them feels like no work at all. So it is with 'The Sisters Brothers'.

Set in gold rush era America - the book follows the story of Eli and Charlie Sisters - hired killers and brothers -  as they travel across America in pursuit of their target - the wonderfully named: Herman Kermitt Warm.. 

As with a lot of good books, its not the outcome of their journey that is the main thing, but their experience on the way. The story is narrated by Eli - the younger, softer and more philosophical of the two. In my head, Eli's voice sounded something like Nicholas Cage's voice in Raising Arizona, a friendly, curious and slightly simple fellow. He tells us of the brothers bickering relationship, how they came to be in this line of work, Charlie's weakness for Brandy and Eli's own longing to be out of the murder business for something far simpler. 

While Charlie finds comfort in Brandy, accumulating wealth, and being the most feared man in the west, Eli contemplates the wonderful invention of toothbrushing, gives his money to anyone who will treat him kindly, and sticks by his slow and troublesome horse: Tub, when he should have gotten rid of it some time ago. The brothers come across a wide range of eccentric characters - giving the book a feeling that it  might have been written by the Coen Brothers. There's that mix of black humour, strange characters, philosophy and cold blooded murder.

I can certainly see the influence of things like Charles Portiss' True Grit and Deadwood through the book  - both of these are very good things. I flew through the 300+ pages of this in about 5 days. Can't recommend it highly enough.