IT WAS never easy, being one of Ronni Sunshine's daughters. Publicly, she was the glamorous, successful, dramatic Hollywood actress. Privately, she was self-absorbed, angry, and a disinterested, narcissistic mother.
Now in her sixties, Ronni has had strange symptoms for a while, but has refused to believe her diagnosis: she has ALS, a degenerative motor neuron disease. There is no cure.
Ronni's three adult daughters - Nell, Meredith, and Lizzy all left home at the first opportunity and are now largely estranged, both from their mother and from each other.
This is the storyline for Jane Green's latest novel The Sunshine Sisters which shifts between characters' perspectives giving readers glimpses into their dysfunctional lives as they reach to you from the pages each with their failings, weaknesses and troubles.
All three sisters are going through crises of their own, but as Ronni's health fails more and more she is adamant that they must come home, and help her take her own life. She has the oxycontin pills carefully stockpiled for the occasion.
And as their mother's illness draws them together to confront old jealousies and secret fears, they discover that blood might be thicker than water after all.
The Sunshine Sisters is a moving story of family, love and loss by bestselling author of Falling.
- The Sunshine Sisters, Pan Macmillan, $29.99 www.panmacmillan.com.au
