06/17/2026
"Our Sister's Keeper"
by Jasmine Holmes
Bookseller Review 📚:
In 1927 Mississippi, the ambitious Thea Elliot and her husband, Kid, are welcomed to East Cobb, an affluent, all-Black town that promises a fruitful life untouched by the oppression of white Southerners.
All-Black, that is, except for the aptly-named Doctor Grimm who is known to own the land underneath East Cobb-dwellers' feet.
The doc and his assistant, Clotilde, keep two gardens - a literal garden behind their manor and laboratory, and a garden of young women who are kept separate from the rest of this idyllic town. Both are meticulously tended by this insidious pair.
Marah has been a wilting flower in Clotilde's garden for as long as she can remember - literally. She retains no memory of any reality other than her current role as a carrier of the memories of the men of East Cobb. She and her "sisters" serve as vessels for emotional and physical pain, ones that must remain empty of their own baggage to have perpetual room for the burdens of the men in their community.
When Thea begins to see and hear terrifying spectres of mutilated women who shriek out in demand of retribution, she is horrified to learn that she alone seems to be afflicted by these visions.
Except, she is not alone. Marah and her sisters are well acquainted with the town's "groanings", and their blood--chilling origins.
It's only when the realities of these two women collide that the curtain is drawn back on the inner workings of East Cobb - and who will survive when its secrets are revealed.
The burdens borne by Black women scream out from the pages of this book - the fictional ones by the carriers of East Cobb, and the very real weight of current and generational trauma and oppression carried by Black women here and now on this side of the page. Wow, wow, wow."
