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Dual Citizens: A novel
Following The Missing Person and Inside, Alix Ohlin's third novel is a masterful achievement: a joint coming-of-age story and an achingly poignant portrait of the strange, painful, ultimately life-sustaining bonds between sisters.
Lark and Robin are half-sisters whose similarities end at being named for birds. While Lark is shy and studious, Robin is wild and artistic. Raised in Montreal by their disinterested single mother, they form a fierce team in childhood despite these differences. As they grow up, Lark excels at school and Robin becomes an extraordinary pianist. At seventeen, Lark flees to America to attend college, where she finds her calling in documentary films, and her sister soon joins her.
Later, in New York City, the sisters find themselves tested: Lark struggles with self-doubt, and Robin chafes against the demands of Juilliard. Under pressure, their bond grows strained and ultimately broken, and their paths diverge. Lark leaves New York when she meets Lawrence Wheelock, a renowned filmmaker who becomes both her employer and occasional lover, while Robin returns to Canada. When Wheelock denies Lark what she hopes for most of all--a child--she is forced to re-examine a life marked by unrealized ambitions and thwarted desires. And as she takes charge of her destiny, Lark discovers that despite their complicated, oftentimes painful relationship, there is only one person she can truly rely on: her sister.
In this gripping, unforgettable novel about motherhood, sisterhood, desire, and self-knowledge, Alix Ohlin traces the rich and complex path towards fulfillment as an artist and a human being, capturing the peculiar language of sisters and making visible the imperceptible strings that bind us to the ones we love--or have loved--for good.
Lark and Robin are half-sisters whose similarities end at being named for birds. While Lark is shy and studious, Robin is wild and artistic. Raised in Montreal by their disinterested single mother, they form a fierce team in childhood despite these differences. As they grow up, Lark excels at school and Robin becomes an extraordinary pianist. At seventeen, Lark flees to America to attend college, where she finds her calling in documentary films, and her sister soon joins her.
Later, in New York City, the sisters find themselves tested: Lark struggles with self-doubt, and Robin chafes against the demands of Juilliard. Under pressure, their bond grows strained and ultimately broken, and their paths diverge. Lark leaves New York when she meets Lawrence Wheelock, a renowned filmmaker who becomes both her employer and occasional lover, while Robin returns to Canada. When Wheelock denies Lark what she hopes for most of all--a child--she is forced to re-examine a life marked by unrealized ambitions and thwarted desires. And as she takes charge of her destiny, Lark discovers that despite their complicated, oftentimes painful relationship, there is only one person she can truly rely on: her sister.
In this gripping, unforgettable novel about motherhood, sisterhood, desire, and self-knowledge, Alix Ohlin traces the rich and complex path towards fulfillment as an artist and a human being, capturing the peculiar language of sisters and making visible the imperceptible strings that bind us to the ones we love--or have loved--for good.
288 pages, Hardcover
First published June 4, 2019
About the author
Alix Ohlin
17 books220 followersAlix Ohlin is the author of The Missing Person, a novel; Babylon and Other Stories; and Signs and Wonders, a story collection. Her work has appeared in Best American Short Stories, Best New American Voices, and on public radio’s Selected Shorts. She lives in Vancouver, BC.
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January 22, 2019
I’ll begin with the obvious: The book cover is GORGEOUS!
Between the book cover, the author’s lovely name (this is my first novel by Alix Ohlin, - not my last), and the well written descriptive blurb - I knew instantly that I was wanted to read this.
This 288 page novel ( ebook for me) - narrated with intimate storytelling - solemn - genuine - timeless - filled with awareness of thought - emotional connectedness - and illustrates the profound impact and consequences of how family tensions bind us.
If you are a person like me - who already was sold with the blurb and book cover - you don’t need to read anything more I write. I won’t write any spoilers ....
so if you choose to continue to read this - there is no reason to fear about me giving any juicy details away.
MOST READERS KNOW.... if this book is at least a TYPE of book you’d enjoy.
Reflective, about the bonds of sisters, ( both coming of age), raised by a single - ( disinterested type), mother.
Lark & Robin - half sisters named after bird’s - share a duel citizenship between Canada and The United States. We journey with them into adulthood: each very different.....but have a strong sisterly bond.
We dive into their lives: jobs, passions, men, history, personality, quirks, and their individual & joint trials & tribulations. Each has a different experience being raised by the same mother. Or at least expresses their thoughts of their mother differently.
Lark is the oldest sister and novel’s narrator. She’s the sister who dwells on their past history. For Lark, every memory is lodged unwaveringly in her memory. Robin might say she doesn’t remember.
I related to this story. I have one sister ( 5 years older than me). We also were raised by a single mother who wasn’t much interested in our lives.
Our mother’s famous words to both my sister and I growing up were:
“You do your thing, and I’ll do mine”.
Robin and Lark’s mother was the same way.
My own sister and I share many similarities between our relationship - in relationship with our mother - in the exact way Lark and Robin did.
When Lark was an adult — she would call Robin on the phone hoping that Robin would join Lark in her anger towards their mother. She wanted Robin to acknowledge the victimization that they grew up with. Lark told Robin that their mother was a narcissist and that she should never have been a mother in the first place. Lark was hoping for sisterly-agreement.
But Robin would get defensive and say, “then where would we be?”. ( guilty...I acted in the same way Robin did....not wanting to give my sister the satisfaction that she was right).... BUT MY OLDER SISTER WAS RIGHT! ( took me longer to grow into the truth)....it hurt too much to face for many years.
Robin, never defended their mother, Marianne, but neither would she add her own criticism. The only time she argued with Lark, was when she talked morosely about how their lives were off track, how with different parents and a different childhood they might have been successful, maybe even happy.
My older sister often did the same with me - she called me wanting ( and years later I learned needing), my agreement and validation that my sister was right about our mother.
For years I pushed myself away if Gail, my sister, wanted me to agree with her that our mother wasn’t interested in us. We had already lost one parent ( early death of our dad).... so I sure as hell didn’t need my sister telling me how much we were a burden to our mother.
Yet.....as I got older - I knew my sister was absolutely accurate.
The family dynamics in this story feel so real - I almost wondered if this was autobiographical.
Perhaps this is not a book for everyone..... but for those of us whom it is.....
It’s a beautifully written ...... dealing tenderly and honestly with life struggles from feeling invisible as a child - wishing to be seen - to adult struggles: psychological awakening’s, finances, illness, desires, limitations, and love that ties us together.
Thank You Knopf Publishing, and Alix Ohlin.
This book is released in stores in May, 2019.
Between the book cover, the author’s lovely name (this is my first novel by Alix Ohlin, - not my last), and the well written descriptive blurb - I knew instantly that I was wanted to read this.
This 288 page novel ( ebook for me) - narrated with intimate storytelling - solemn - genuine - timeless - filled with awareness of thought - emotional connectedness - and illustrates the profound impact and consequences of how family tensions bind us.
If you are a person like me - who already was sold with the blurb and book cover - you don’t need to read anything more I write. I won’t write any spoilers ....
so if you choose to continue to read this - there is no reason to fear about me giving any juicy details away.
MOST READERS KNOW.... if this book is at least a TYPE of book you’d enjoy.
Reflective, about the bonds of sisters, ( both coming of age), raised by a single - ( disinterested type), mother.
Lark & Robin - half sisters named after bird’s - share a duel citizenship between Canada and The United States. We journey with them into adulthood: each very different.....but have a strong sisterly bond.
We dive into their lives: jobs, passions, men, history, personality, quirks, and their individual & joint trials & tribulations. Each has a different experience being raised by the same mother. Or at least expresses their thoughts of their mother differently.
Lark is the oldest sister and novel’s narrator. She’s the sister who dwells on their past history. For Lark, every memory is lodged unwaveringly in her memory. Robin might say she doesn’t remember.
I related to this story. I have one sister ( 5 years older than me). We also were raised by a single mother who wasn’t much interested in our lives.
Our mother’s famous words to both my sister and I growing up were:
“You do your thing, and I’ll do mine”.
Robin and Lark’s mother was the same way.
My own sister and I share many similarities between our relationship - in relationship with our mother - in the exact way Lark and Robin did.
When Lark was an adult — she would call Robin on the phone hoping that Robin would join Lark in her anger towards their mother. She wanted Robin to acknowledge the victimization that they grew up with. Lark told Robin that their mother was a narcissist and that she should never have been a mother in the first place. Lark was hoping for sisterly-agreement.
But Robin would get defensive and say, “then where would we be?”. ( guilty...I acted in the same way Robin did....not wanting to give my sister the satisfaction that she was right).... BUT MY OLDER SISTER WAS RIGHT! ( took me longer to grow into the truth)....it hurt too much to face for many years.
Robin, never defended their mother, Marianne, but neither would she add her own criticism. The only time she argued with Lark, was when she talked morosely about how their lives were off track, how with different parents and a different childhood they might have been successful, maybe even happy.
My older sister often did the same with me - she called me wanting ( and years later I learned needing), my agreement and validation that my sister was right about our mother.
For years I pushed myself away if Gail, my sister, wanted me to agree with her that our mother wasn’t interested in us. We had already lost one parent ( early death of our dad).... so I sure as hell didn’t need my sister telling me how much we were a burden to our mother.
Yet.....as I got older - I knew my sister was absolutely accurate.
The family dynamics in this story feel so real - I almost wondered if this was autobiographical.
Perhaps this is not a book for everyone..... but for those of us whom it is.....
It’s a beautifully written ...... dealing tenderly and honestly with life struggles from feeling invisible as a child - wishing to be seen - to adult struggles: psychological awakening’s, finances, illness, desires, limitations, and love that ties us together.
Thank You Knopf Publishing, and Alix Ohlin.
This book is released in stores in May, 2019.
October 24, 2019
Note: spoilers ahead
Lark and Robin are half-sisters, products of their young, free-spirited mother’s relationships with different American men. The girls essentially raise themselves in Montreal. Their mother provides shelter, food, and clothing, but Marianne is otherwise almost entirely uninterested in them. A high-school dropout, she works at a variety of low-paying jobs and goes through a number of boyfriends during her daughters’ time with her. Eventually, Lark (the narrator, older sister by four years, and an excellent student) gets a full scholarship to a small college in Massachusetts and leaves home. In time, Robin follows her, apparently to escape the attention of one of her mother’s boyfriends, the stylish Herve, who takes an unnatural interest in the girl, showering her with an array of designer clothes. Robin is a gifted pianist. Once she arrives in Massachusetts, her older sister manages to set up lessons for her with a Russian émigré music professor. He too develops a proprietary attitude towards Robin. Ultimately, the sisters end up in New York: Lark in film school and Robin at Juilliard. Neither will end up completing their programs. Lark becomes the protégé (and more) of an eccentric but respected experimental film maker; Robin flees a European concert tour, purchases a large parcel of land in rural Quebec (with money she inherits from her paternal grandparents), and creates a nature preserve for wolves—with which, we are to believe, she is mystically connected.
Ohlin’s novel follows the sisters into their mid to late thirties. Although I’ve given a bare-bones run-down of the plot (above), there are one or two key events which happen in the last third of the book that I’ve left out. They don’t make for a particularly satisfying conclusion to what (in the second half of the novel at least) is a pretty listless and lacklustre narrative overall.
In her Acknowledgments, Ohlin thanks one of her friends, Amy Williams, “who saw what I was trying to do from the start.” I wish Ms. Williams had written an afterword to explain what exactly that was. I honestly can’t say I understand what Ohlin’s intentions were. There’s certainly plenty of artsy ruminating about various movies, film theory, editing techniques, and (to a lesser extent) music. Ohlin is also interested in the mentor-protégé relationship (or power dynamic) and relationships between mothers, daughters, and sisters. Lark and Robin, with their American fathers (neither of whom makes an appearance, by the way), are literally dual citizens of the US and Canada, but Ohlin seems to be pointing to their being part of two worlds: the human world (of art and creativity) and the natural/biological world. Robin identifies with wolves, apparently seeing herself as related to them, while Lark in her mid-thirties is struck with the biological urge to have a child.
I did enjoy the first half of the novel, but I sure wasn’t impressed with the second. It felt loose, unfocused, and even pedestrian. How the novel made it onto Canada’s Giller Prize shortlist is beyond me. As my rating shows, I just don’t think it’s very good.
Lark and Robin are half-sisters, products of their young, free-spirited mother’s relationships with different American men. The girls essentially raise themselves in Montreal. Their mother provides shelter, food, and clothing, but Marianne is otherwise almost entirely uninterested in them. A high-school dropout, she works at a variety of low-paying jobs and goes through a number of boyfriends during her daughters’ time with her. Eventually, Lark (the narrator, older sister by four years, and an excellent student) gets a full scholarship to a small college in Massachusetts and leaves home. In time, Robin follows her, apparently to escape the attention of one of her mother’s boyfriends, the stylish Herve, who takes an unnatural interest in the girl, showering her with an array of designer clothes. Robin is a gifted pianist. Once she arrives in Massachusetts, her older sister manages to set up lessons for her with a Russian émigré music professor. He too develops a proprietary attitude towards Robin. Ultimately, the sisters end up in New York: Lark in film school and Robin at Juilliard. Neither will end up completing their programs. Lark becomes the protégé (and more) of an eccentric but respected experimental film maker; Robin flees a European concert tour, purchases a large parcel of land in rural Quebec (with money she inherits from her paternal grandparents), and creates a nature preserve for wolves—with which, we are to believe, she is mystically connected.
Ohlin’s novel follows the sisters into their mid to late thirties. Although I’ve given a bare-bones run-down of the plot (above), there are one or two key events which happen in the last third of the book that I’ve left out. They don’t make for a particularly satisfying conclusion to what (in the second half of the novel at least) is a pretty listless and lacklustre narrative overall.
In her Acknowledgments, Ohlin thanks one of her friends, Amy Williams, “who saw what I was trying to do from the start.” I wish Ms. Williams had written an afterword to explain what exactly that was. I honestly can’t say I understand what Ohlin’s intentions were. There’s certainly plenty of artsy ruminating about various movies, film theory, editing techniques, and (to a lesser extent) music. Ohlin is also interested in the mentor-protégé relationship (or power dynamic) and relationships between mothers, daughters, and sisters. Lark and Robin, with their American fathers (neither of whom makes an appearance, by the way), are literally dual citizens of the US and Canada, but Ohlin seems to be pointing to their being part of two worlds: the human world (of art and creativity) and the natural/biological world. Robin identifies with wolves, apparently seeing herself as related to them, while Lark in her mid-thirties is struck with the biological urge to have a child.
I did enjoy the first half of the novel, but I sure wasn’t impressed with the second. It felt loose, unfocused, and even pedestrian. How the novel made it onto Canada’s Giller Prize shortlist is beyond me. As my rating shows, I just don’t think it’s very good.
June 11, 2019
(2.75) I hadn’t heard of Ohlin, a Canadian author, but took a chance on her third novel because I was intrigued by the title and the prospect of a close yet fraught sister relationship. Lark Brossard and her younger half-sister, Robin, were raised by an inattentive single mother in Montreal; both their fathers were American, so they come and go from the USA as they wish – Lark attends college in Boston; afterwards the sisters live in New York City to pursue their passions: documentary film-making for Lark, and the piano for Robin.
The characters are driven by obsessions that shift over the course of the book. So for Lark, while a love of film carries through, she later becomes overtaken by the desire to have a child, even though she has no steady partner. Robin drifts away from the piano and becomes devoted to a pack of wolves on the Canadian land she bought to run as a nature preserve. “What I found wild, she found a comfort, and that had always been a difference between us,” Lark writes of Robin. They have to work together to nurture these separate goals.
Lark narrates the story with plain honesty, and I found her more sympathetic than Robin. However, there is a lot of “this happened, then this happened” telling, and many interesting elements that pile up but together don’t seem to contribute to an overall meaning. What I’m more likely to remember from this book than the big moments or themes are the tiny details Ohlin peppers in, like the fact that their mother worked for a digestive biscuit company and they ate so many free biscuits that eventually they couldn’t stand them; that Lark’s college boyfriend hiked the Appalachian Trail after graduation and broke up with her via a letter sent en route; that they hold a watery funeral for Beowulf, her roommate’s cat; and so on.
Ironically, Lark’s specialty is editing film – cutting and joining scenes – but bringing all the scenes into a cohesive whole is what I felt was lacking here. I would read more from Ohlin, though – perhaps the short story form is where she shines?
(If you’re particularly interested in books about women and wolves, you may want to read Sister Wolf by Ann Arensberg or The Wolf Border by Sarah Hall.)
The characters are driven by obsessions that shift over the course of the book. So for Lark, while a love of film carries through, she later becomes overtaken by the desire to have a child, even though she has no steady partner. Robin drifts away from the piano and becomes devoted to a pack of wolves on the Canadian land she bought to run as a nature preserve. “What I found wild, she found a comfort, and that had always been a difference between us,” Lark writes of Robin. They have to work together to nurture these separate goals.
Lark narrates the story with plain honesty, and I found her more sympathetic than Robin. However, there is a lot of “this happened, then this happened” telling, and many interesting elements that pile up but together don’t seem to contribute to an overall meaning. What I’m more likely to remember from this book than the big moments or themes are the tiny details Ohlin peppers in, like the fact that their mother worked for a digestive biscuit company and they ate so many free biscuits that eventually they couldn’t stand them; that Lark’s college boyfriend hiked the Appalachian Trail after graduation and broke up with her via a letter sent en route; that they hold a watery funeral for Beowulf, her roommate’s cat; and so on.
Ironically, Lark’s specialty is editing film – cutting and joining scenes – but bringing all the scenes into a cohesive whole is what I felt was lacking here. I would read more from Ohlin, though – perhaps the short story form is where she shines?
(If you’re particularly interested in books about women and wolves, you may want to read Sister Wolf by Ann Arensberg or The Wolf Border by Sarah Hall.)
March 4, 2019
I filmed the teenagers who gathered at the ice cream parlor, the girls flirting by pressing their hands quickly to the boys' arms and then recoiling from their muscles as if burned; the boys yelling insults to each other or calling out from the rolled-down windows of passing cars, everyone performing, summertime a stage. I was recording an adolescence I'd never had. In the garden shed I cut the film together, cicadas and girls, old men and moonlight. All my life I'd gathered tidbits – things I read, a picture that lingered, the memory of an afternoon in a movie theatre, the face of my sister as she laughed – and sometimes my head felt cluttered as an attic with them. But stitching a film together satisfied this collector's itch perfectly, my magpie treasures woven and spackled into a nest.
Dual Citizens is a story of two sisters – from the POV of the elder, from childhood up to her late thirties – and although some really large events happen in their lives, Alix Ohlin writes with such calm and equanimity that nothing feels melodramatic or excessive in hindsight. This is a realistic story that captures the truth of relationships, heartache, and the quest for meaning. Quiet and relatable, this was a lovely read. (Note: I read an ARC and quotes may not be in their final forms.)
I remember Olga lecturing in an almost empty hall at Worthen; she was talking about Eisenstein, the great Russian filmmaker, and his theories of dialectical montage. He was interested in editing for contrast as well as continuity. If you juxtapose two images, he said – or Olga said – no matter how different, the viewer will make meaning from the montage. The second image in the sequence will alter the meaning of the first. It was, I thought, how memory worked: yoking disparate elements together across time. My sister next to me now changed how I thought of her then. My sister next to me changed how I thought of myself.
Born to a disinterested single mother and with two different fathers, Lark and Robin essentially raise themselves in Montreal. Lark – always out to please – does exceptionally well at school, and when they discover that Robin has a gift for the piano, they secretly arrange for lessons with a local teacher. The girls couldn't be closer – whispering in their beds at night, Lark protecting and supporting Robin with everything she needs – but when the elder sister gets a chance for a full-ride scholarship to an American college, she jumps at the chance to escape their cold and abusive mother. Within a year, Robin runs away from home to join her sister in exile – and while this will eventually put Robin on a path to Julliard and recognition for her remarkable talents, the sisters will have suffered a rift that might never be healed again. As Lark switches her interests from making her own films to editing those of a rising documentarian, the sisters' paths diverge; Robin, as always, following her own path and Lark, as always, allowing herself to become a supporting player in someone else's drama. When Lark does eventually realise what self-fulfillment might look like, she'll need her sister's help; but is it too late for them to come together?
That's a rough overview of the plot, but so much more is going on in this novel. I think that Ohlin nailed the complicated relationship between these two very different women, and especially their different attitudes towards their mother (Robin will neither be drawn into complaining about how awful their childhood was, nor will she offer any sympathy as their mother begins to need them). I liked everything I learned about filmmaking and piano playing, and as ever, I tend to think that when an author is writing about other art forms, she's really writing about her own. I liked Robin rebelling against Julliard instructors who wanted her to remove her own emotions from her playing (if you remove the self, what is music?) and I liked Lark's eventual embracement of (heavily edited and moulded) reality television as the only honest art form. These quotes about filmmaking and film watching could easily be about writing and reading novels:
He talked about the camera as a kind of mirror held up to the content of the scene, making its presence felt even though the equipment is itself unseen. He said any filmmaker embodied the Heisenberg uncertainty principle, affecting the proceedings by observing them, and that the complexity of filmmaking embraced this complication rather than attempting to smooth it away.
And later:
I've watched the movie many times since then. And each time I see it differently; sometimes its wit makes me laugh, other times I've shuddered at the meanness of it, its smartly directed blows. On that day, which was my first viewing, it made me feel as if something had been taken away from me, though I couldn't have said what; like all films, it showed me a reflection of myself, and the reflection was injured and dented, open to theft.
And I'm left musing on the book's title. Each of the sisters had been fathered by an American and born in their mother's Montreal; each of them choosing to live on an opposite side of the border in their adult lives. This physical boundary no doubt affected their emotional distance and “dual citizens” speaks of divided loyalties and unfixed futures. Maddeningly, for me, Ohlin didn't use the phrase in the body of the book, so I'm left to muse on this without her help (which is another interesting choice).
Dual Citizens is a lovely montage/magpie's nest of scenes that give a thoroughly relatable overview of a life and its most important relationship. Interesting events occur, but mostly it's quiet and introspective; a joy to read.
June 7, 2019
I was extremely fortunate to hear Alix Ohlin speak right before the release of Dual Citizens, her latest novel. To say I was impressed by her accomplishments, highlighted by the woman introducing her that day, is an understatement. In the audience were teachers from her school in Montreal, so proud of their former student. When it was her turn to speak, Alix was open and spoke of her life journey, of learning about what type of books she was meant to author. She loves stories, collecting them from her own life, like Wheelock in the novel, who everyday, brought home pieces of his life in his pockets, and emptied them on his shelves, and like the magpies, that are also collectors of stuff from their flights. She also expressed her interest in female to female relationships - mother to daughter, sister to sister, friend to friend. This is the substance of Dual Citizens - the complexities and the importance of these relationships.
The book tells the coming of age story of Lark and Robin, born in Montreal, to a very young and very unprepared mother. The story, crosses the border to the United States, where the sisters are educated, (as Alix Ohlin was, at Harvard etc.), with a return to the Canadian side, at the end (Alix is at University of British Columbia, but she also sat in the Mordechai Richler Chair at McGill University).
I am in awe of @alixohlin (had to say this, even though it is obvious). I love finding #canadianauthors, and even more so, #montrealauthors to read, and who write about #home and life in our country, and cities! Thank you 🙏🏻 @alixohlin for your wonderful book! I loved 💕 it. #5⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️’s.
The book tells the coming of age story of Lark and Robin, born in Montreal, to a very young and very unprepared mother. The story, crosses the border to the United States, where the sisters are educated, (as Alix Ohlin was, at Harvard etc.), with a return to the Canadian side, at the end (Alix is at University of British Columbia, but she also sat in the Mordechai Richler Chair at McGill University).
I am in awe of @alixohlin (had to say this, even though it is obvious). I love finding #canadianauthors, and even more so, #montrealauthors to read, and who write about #home and life in our country, and cities! Thank you 🙏🏻 @alixohlin for your wonderful book! I loved 💕 it. #5⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️’s.
May 22, 2020
For anyone who is fortunate enough to have a sister – and I count myself among them – the deep understanding of these indelible, complex and fiercely knitted ties is a very special gift. Perhaps that is why so many writers gravitate to the theme of sisterhood, including Julia Alvarez, who captures the exasperation, life-sustaining bonds that last a lifetime.
Alix Ohlin introduces two sisters – Lark and Robin – who are products of an indifferent Canadian mother and two separate fathers. Lark embodies the key qualities of her namesake: agreeable, conscientious and proactive. Her younger sister Robin is flightier and possesses a strong musical gift—she is a talented pianist.
As true dual citizens—their fathers are both U.S. citizens—Lark and Robin find their way to Boston and then to New York City and beyond as they continue to come together and drift apart. Lark gravitates to a documentary film career and for a time, teams with a highly respected yet elusive older filmmaker. Robin takes another route, embracing and then discarding her natural-born talent and making inexplicable lifestyle choices.
Yet the tenuous but powerful bond that holds them together means that they show up at each other’s door during the most challenging of times. And during those times, the sisters instinctively know how to give each other what they want and need the most.
There is much to enjoy about this deeply felt book, which never failed to keep my interest. At the same time, it has its flaws. Like many other books that focus on the “artiste”, the film-making sections tended to be too detailed and pedantic; Ms. Ohlin is best when she focuses on the characters instead of the process.
Similarly, the book, which encompasses only 270 pages, takes on too many years and too many lifestyle evolutions, sometimes reminding me of a “that…and then THAT…and later THAT” format that many sagas fall victim to. I didn’t quite understand one of Lark’s most heartfelt yearnings; it didn’t quite seem organic. Still, this is a well-crafted book that is worth reading. 3.5 stars.
Alix Ohlin introduces two sisters – Lark and Robin – who are products of an indifferent Canadian mother and two separate fathers. Lark embodies the key qualities of her namesake: agreeable, conscientious and proactive. Her younger sister Robin is flightier and possesses a strong musical gift—she is a talented pianist.
As true dual citizens—their fathers are both U.S. citizens—Lark and Robin find their way to Boston and then to New York City and beyond as they continue to come together and drift apart. Lark gravitates to a documentary film career and for a time, teams with a highly respected yet elusive older filmmaker. Robin takes another route, embracing and then discarding her natural-born talent and making inexplicable lifestyle choices.
Yet the tenuous but powerful bond that holds them together means that they show up at each other’s door during the most challenging of times. And during those times, the sisters instinctively know how to give each other what they want and need the most.
There is much to enjoy about this deeply felt book, which never failed to keep my interest. At the same time, it has its flaws. Like many other books that focus on the “artiste”, the film-making sections tended to be too detailed and pedantic; Ms. Ohlin is best when she focuses on the characters instead of the process.
Similarly, the book, which encompasses only 270 pages, takes on too many years and too many lifestyle evolutions, sometimes reminding me of a “that…and then THAT…and later THAT” format that many sagas fall victim to. I didn’t quite understand one of Lark’s most heartfelt yearnings; it didn’t quite seem organic. Still, this is a well-crafted book that is worth reading. 3.5 stars.
September 17, 2019
I've followed Ohlin's career since I was a young woman; I read an article called "Profiles in Cheapness," where she was featured in Mademoiselle magazine--remember Mademoiselle?--on living on a limited income. When her first book was published, I remembered her name and was drawn by both her voice as well as her ability to delve deeply into human feelings. Since then, I've read everything she's written, and this beautiful survival story of two Canadian sisters, how their stark differences complement each other, is so engrossing, I could not stop reading; it's almost very stream of consciousness. I especially love how Ohlin captures the "orphans in the storm" relationship between two very different and wounded sisters, older, introverted Lark and colorful and passionate Robin, the hodgepodge of people in their lives in lieu of their distant mother, and the subtle distinctions between Canadian vs United States culture. Loved it.
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June 18, 2019I have to agree 100% with Rebecca's review https://www.goodreads.com/review/show....
I only ever felt at a distant arm's length from Lark, and nothing too much at all for Robin. Part 1: Before and some of Part 2: Childhood were the best parts in my opinion. This is where we get the background and development on the indifference of their mother and the shaping of their coming of age. But as we move through the story, I couldn't escape the distant feeling and its overall flatness - I skimmed quite a bit to the end.
Bummer. But this wasn't the satisfying read I was hoping it would be.
I only ever felt at a distant arm's length from Lark, and nothing too much at all for Robin. Part 1: Before and some of Part 2: Childhood were the best parts in my opinion. This is where we get the background and development on the indifference of their mother and the shaping of their coming of age. But as we move through the story, I couldn't escape the distant feeling and its overall flatness - I skimmed quite a bit to the end.
Bummer. But this wasn't the satisfying read I was hoping it would be.
December 1, 2020
regular food tasted terrible, like metal in her mouth. she craved burned matches and stones. she showed me a little grey rock she carried in the pocket of her jacket, clean from licking.
November 1, 2019
I listened to this one in audio.
I enjoyed this book quite a bit, but am a bit surprised it made the Giller short list. I loved her book Inside so much, and I did not feel this book did as good a job describing what was going on inside of the characters.
What I did really enjoy is the descriptions while Lark is studying films.
I enjoyed this book quite a bit, but am a bit surprised it made the Giller short list. I loved her book Inside so much, and I did not feel this book did as good a job describing what was going on inside of the characters.
What I did really enjoy is the descriptions while Lark is studying films.
November 18, 2019
A tale of two sisters whose bond is a strong one, growing up with a neglectful mother, and the paths that tear them apart and bring them together again.
https://www.instagram.com/p/B45ZJ6SgV...
https://www.instagram.com/p/B45ZJ6SgV...
December 27, 2019
I thought this was a solid 4 star book until I got to the end. Then it just seemed odd and out of sorts and weird.
August 12, 2019
A traditional, old-fashioned novel--in a good way. The sprawling and yet contained life story of sisters Lark and Robin, Dual Citizens is beautifully written and full of delicate character work and small, bright, smartly chosen detail. Not a lot happens except that two women grow up, grow apart, come back together, but the strength of the writing itself manages to make that pretty riveting.
I wish the book felt like it added up to something of a little more weight, though--psychologically, emotionally, whatever. Maybe that's an unfair demand, but I wanted more oomph from prose this good. Either way, though, Ohlin is definitely a writer I will look for more from.
I wish the book felt like it added up to something of a little more weight, though--psychologically, emotionally, whatever. Maybe that's an unfair demand, but I wanted more oomph from prose this good. Either way, though, Ohlin is definitely a writer I will look for more from.
July 12, 2019
Disappointing. I liked her previous novel. But I just couldn't like either of these sisters and as they got along in their lives the less interested I was in their progress. They both seem to be reaching out to absurdity and it just got boring.
May 27, 2020
Half-sisters Lark and Robin have a mother whose detachment from them forces the girls to grow up mostly caring for themselves. They develop a close bond throughout their adolescence, but Lark possesses a more grounded and goal-oriented personality, while Robin has a restless and wild streak with artistic inclinations. Upon finishing high school, Lark heads to college in New York City, where she develops a fascination with film editing. Soon thereafter, Robin, a precocious pianist, also leaves behind the strangeness of her mother and her newest boyfriend, and so she joins Lark in the city. After a fracture in their relationship, Lark devotes her skills to working for an auteur documentary filmmaker, and Robin eventually retreats to the countryside with a commitment to running an animal commune for wolves. Dual Citizens offers a story of aching tenderness and searing intimacy that endeared me to the sisters and had me invested in and caring for them through every hardship and challenge they faced. With touching and heartfelt insight, Ohlin examines the complexity of emotion surrounding each of their decisions. Her gorgeous, mesmeric prose and the effortless pacing in how she chronicles the lives of the sisters make the narrative richly compelling and illuminating. I found myself immersed in the sisters’ story, at once melancholic and beautiful, and which at times both broke my heart with sadness and filled it with joy.
March 29, 2020
3.5 stars I did enjoy this story of the close yet complicated relationship between 2 sisters for the most part. I hoped to understand why Robin treated Lark so shabbily by the end of the book, but that didn't happen. Always bugs me that "artistic" people, in books at least, are somehow always given a pass on what is really just bad behaviour.
February 11, 2020
Dual Citizens is one of the those weird creations of Canadian literature that I ended up really loving, yet wouldn't necessarily recommend to everyone. It's a bit of an artsy story with a meandering plot, but it's ultimately about family and sisterhood and that really resonated with me.
Lark and Robin are sisters that grew up in Montreal and received little attention or praise from their young mother. So they instead look to one another for support and long for the day when they can branch out on their own. Lark is shy but very studious and does well in school, earning herself a scholarship for a college in the States. Robin learns to play the piano and has a natural talent for it. She is dismayed when Lark leaves her behind to go to school and within the year she runs away to live with Lark.
Eventually Lark discovers a love for film and Robin is accepted to study piano at Julliard. But the pressure of music school gets to her and as Lark dives further into her film degree, the sisters begin to grow apart. The separation between the two sisters was jarring and upsetting for me. They were all each other had and I felt as set adrift by the separation as Lark did. The sisters are very different and Lark struggles to understand why her sister suddenly distances herself and they begin to grow apart, each caught up in their own struggles and insecurities.
Lark spends a lot of time working in the film industry and is quite successful, but she reads like a character who just moves through life without actually engaging in it. She is passive in every scenario and I really felt like part of her was missing during her estrangement from Robin. I'm not really an artsy person and I don't care for film, but I really loved the storytelling in this book. I just felt this ache throughout for the relationship that Lark and Robin once had and the strain and impact that the loss of communication had on Lark. The feeling of incompleteness while the two were separated and the tenseness that continued between them even once they were reunited. It's scary to watch two people that were so close become disconnected to the point that they don't really know who the other person is anymore.
It really reminded me of the feelings of nostalgia and sadness that you get when you return home and realize that the people you loved and spent so much time with have all changed. The feeling of moving on, but thinking fondly of the experiences you once shared, but the sadness of realizing that some experience meant more to one person than the other.
It's hard to describe, but Lark's longing for both motherhood and a renewed relationship with her sister were so authentic. It's a slow moving story with little driving the plot, but I related so keenly to Lark. I think Ohlin captured a very flawed, but real relationship, and I felt really invested in Lark's life. I don't think it's a story for everyone though and I'm not sure I'd want to read it again because of the emotional toll, but I'm glad to have picked it up and thoroughly enjoyed the audiobook. A great story with a lot of depth!
Lark and Robin are sisters that grew up in Montreal and received little attention or praise from their young mother. So they instead look to one another for support and long for the day when they can branch out on their own. Lark is shy but very studious and does well in school, earning herself a scholarship for a college in the States. Robin learns to play the piano and has a natural talent for it. She is dismayed when Lark leaves her behind to go to school and within the year she runs away to live with Lark.
Eventually Lark discovers a love for film and Robin is accepted to study piano at Julliard. But the pressure of music school gets to her and as Lark dives further into her film degree, the sisters begin to grow apart. The separation between the two sisters was jarring and upsetting for me. They were all each other had and I felt as set adrift by the separation as Lark did. The sisters are very different and Lark struggles to understand why her sister suddenly distances herself and they begin to grow apart, each caught up in their own struggles and insecurities.
Lark spends a lot of time working in the film industry and is quite successful, but she reads like a character who just moves through life without actually engaging in it. She is passive in every scenario and I really felt like part of her was missing during her estrangement from Robin. I'm not really an artsy person and I don't care for film, but I really loved the storytelling in this book. I just felt this ache throughout for the relationship that Lark and Robin once had and the strain and impact that the loss of communication had on Lark. The feeling of incompleteness while the two were separated and the tenseness that continued between them even once they were reunited. It's scary to watch two people that were so close become disconnected to the point that they don't really know who the other person is anymore.
It really reminded me of the feelings of nostalgia and sadness that you get when you return home and realize that the people you loved and spent so much time with have all changed. The feeling of moving on, but thinking fondly of the experiences you once shared, but the sadness of realizing that some experience meant more to one person than the other.
It's hard to describe, but Lark's longing for both motherhood and a renewed relationship with her sister were so authentic. It's a slow moving story with little driving the plot, but I related so keenly to Lark. I think Ohlin captured a very flawed, but real relationship, and I felt really invested in Lark's life. I don't think it's a story for everyone though and I'm not sure I'd want to read it again because of the emotional toll, but I'm glad to have picked it up and thoroughly enjoyed the audiobook. A great story with a lot of depth!
September 7, 2019
This story of two sisters and their relationship with each other, with their mother, and with the men around them did not flow well for me. I thought the writing was excellent, but the plot, and how it hung together (or didn’t, at times),left me a little cold.
May 16, 2019
Dual Citizens is about two sisters born in Montreal. Their mother does not care about them. Each of the girls has a different father. Perhaps Maryanne (the mother) is bitter because each man has left her. This abandonment their mother has suffered, leaves Lark, the older one, to care for Robin, her sister.
But their relationship is not always good. They do drift apart, eventually to get back together again.
I had a sister once and appreciate reading stories about girl siblings. The relationship does not have to be fully functional for me to enjoy the book. I always learn something about sisterly interactions and embrace the chance to look back on my own relationship with my sister.
I recommend this book to anyone who had or has a sister.
4.5 stars
But their relationship is not always good. They do drift apart, eventually to get back together again.
I had a sister once and appreciate reading stories about girl siblings. The relationship does not have to be fully functional for me to enjoy the book. I always learn something about sisterly interactions and embrace the chance to look back on my own relationship with my sister.
I recommend this book to anyone who had or has a sister.
4.5 stars
November 18, 2019
If this book wins the Giller, I will celebrate, because it means many Canadians will read it and I will have more people to talk to about it. Finished in less than 24 hours.
I can not think of another realistic, family-centred literary novel that has ever hooked me quite like this one. Our narrator is Lark, and we experience life with her from birth to middle-age. Her relationship with her half sister is one of the most influential parts of her life, and so Robin almost becomes a second protagonist herself.
We start with an unsettling scene involving the two sisters in a forest, one pregnant. A wolf, of all things, appears and they know the wolf as Catherine. She charges at them, then past them, and the pregnant sister goes into labour. We don't find out the context or ending of that scene until the very end of the book.
Lark and Robin have a complicated upbringing - emotional abuse and neglect is present, and yet they both manage to become remarkable. Lark is the top of her class in high school and earns a full scholarship, while Robin shows her talent as a piano prodigy. We follow their lives in detail in university and early career.
It is a literary masterpiece, with subtle themes and devices poking their heads up throughout. But it is not pretentious, and is extremely accessible. This is a book that will impress students of literature, and at the same time draw in fans of general fiction.
I can not think of another realistic, family-centred literary novel that has ever hooked me quite like this one. Our narrator is Lark, and we experience life with her from birth to middle-age. Her relationship with her half sister is one of the most influential parts of her life, and so Robin almost becomes a second protagonist herself.
We start with an unsettling scene involving the two sisters in a forest, one pregnant. A wolf, of all things, appears and they know the wolf as Catherine. She charges at them, then past them, and the pregnant sister goes into labour. We don't find out the context or ending of that scene until the very end of the book.
Lark and Robin have a complicated upbringing - emotional abuse and neglect is present, and yet they both manage to become remarkable. Lark is the top of her class in high school and earns a full scholarship, while Robin shows her talent as a piano prodigy. We follow their lives in detail in university and early career.
It is a literary masterpiece, with subtle themes and devices poking their heads up throughout. But it is not pretentious, and is extremely accessible. This is a book that will impress students of literature, and at the same time draw in fans of general fiction.
June 23, 2019
This book is written with grace and a calm realism. It’s the story of two sisters, Lark and Robin, as they grow up with a distant, unprepared mother, find their ways as young adults, then (toward the end) consider their transition into motherhood and, although it is beyond the story, the precipice of middle age by which point I suppose we’re supposed to know who we are. It’s a poignant story and the voice Ohlin gives the characters is sometimes wry, sometimes reluctant, and always tinged with subtle and profound heart. She underplays a lot of the drama in ways that actually make it grander, with so many small, seemingly in-passing descriptions—of a house, of a roommate, of a boyfriend, of a morning—that every page rolls by evenly, effortlessly to the next. I guess you could say the real story is the relationship between the sisters, but someone might also say it’s the way childhood imprints on your adult expectations and experiences, or maybe the real story is more that years can go by, you find your art, and you still don’t know yourself. The publisher says it’s about “art, ambition, sisterhood, motherhood, and self-knowledge” and I guess that’s fair enough. But it felt like more. Whatever you make of it, it was an excellent read, it’s a great way to spend your reading hours.
July 8, 2019
The book follows every single rule of contemporary literary fiction writing (up to and including that it has no real plot--it's 271 pages of methodical recounting and philosophical musings). Yes, I marveled at the sentences, the quietly brilliant observations. But Lark (who wants to have a child) was so alive as a character, while Robin and Marianne (who don't) died (figuratively) on the page. If they’d all been brought to life, the themes would have had some teeth. There might even have been some tension. Along the same lines, the cast of boyfriends were indistinguishable soldiers in a parade, milquetoast and without motivation.
I keep searching, in books, for someone that thinks about this topic the way I do. I'm still searching. I respect and admire the craftsmanship of this book, but the thesis pissed me the hell off.
I keep searching, in books, for someone that thinks about this topic the way I do. I'm still searching. I respect and admire the craftsmanship of this book, but the thesis pissed me the hell off.
October 21, 2019
I both wanted to find out what happens in this book, and simultaneously wanted to put it away and be done with it. The characters suffer in different and unique ways that I couldn't relate to at all, though I did think some of their difficulties are universal. It cut off/ended at a very weird place that didn't feel like an ending.
July 3, 2019
I am completely underwhelmed by this book.
September 16, 2020
4.5/5.
My sister and I always gift each books for Christmas and our birthdays, which means we are both giving and receiving two books with personal inscriptions in the span of 10 days. All of the books we give and receive have underlying themes of dysfunctional families and strong relationships between sisters, much like our upbringing.
Dual Citizens was one of the books I received from my sister. It’s written by a Canadian author about two half sisters, Lark and Robin, born from the same mother and how they grew and how they ended up. Their mother, much like mine, was cold and inattentive. Lark pretty well raised Robin and was very protective of her. Robin ended up being a prodigy pianist and worked her way up to going to Juliard while Lark was an intellect and found interest in film. Their relationship reached its peak at this point and they didn’t see each other for 5 years. The remaining half of the book goes through their lives in adulthood, what each of them went through during those 5 years, how they coped with loss and motherhood.
I found similar traits in myself and Lark, as we both have a need for regularity and routine, and both have the instinctual need to protect our sisters. I also found similar traits in myself and Robin, in that I’m familiar with being pushed and pushed to your maximum that you just snap and never return. Perhaps that is why I enjoyed this book so much and felt connected to it. Dual Citizens was also beautifully written, really poetic and poignant. I feel like this book deserves a much better rating than what was given!
My sister and I always gift each books for Christmas and our birthdays, which means we are both giving and receiving two books with personal inscriptions in the span of 10 days. All of the books we give and receive have underlying themes of dysfunctional families and strong relationships between sisters, much like our upbringing.
Dual Citizens was one of the books I received from my sister. It’s written by a Canadian author about two half sisters, Lark and Robin, born from the same mother and how they grew and how they ended up. Their mother, much like mine, was cold and inattentive. Lark pretty well raised Robin and was very protective of her. Robin ended up being a prodigy pianist and worked her way up to going to Juliard while Lark was an intellect and found interest in film. Their relationship reached its peak at this point and they didn’t see each other for 5 years. The remaining half of the book goes through their lives in adulthood, what each of them went through during those 5 years, how they coped with loss and motherhood.
I found similar traits in myself and Lark, as we both have a need for regularity and routine, and both have the instinctual need to protect our sisters. I also found similar traits in myself and Robin, in that I’m familiar with being pushed and pushed to your maximum that you just snap and never return. Perhaps that is why I enjoyed this book so much and felt connected to it. Dual Citizens was also beautifully written, really poetic and poignant. I feel like this book deserves a much better rating than what was given!
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 12, 2021
While I respect her reading tastes and habits, there is one aspect of one of my book club friend's routine that I can't emulate: she consistently gives books 50 pages to grab her interest and if one hasn't, she puts it aside and moves on to the next. There are times I wish I could adopt her "life's too short" approach, but I simply can't. If I start them, I will (with very rare exceptions) finish them.
Dual Citizens by Alix Ohlin might not have made the cut otherwise. By 50 pages, there were some moments laying out the lives of two contrasting but bonded sisters, told from the point of view of the elder sibling, that suggested more substance to come. Their mercurial and mystifying mother intermittently intrigued. But at that same juncture, nothing was gaining full emotional purchase, even though at that point, the narrator was experiencing the sundering of a then significant relationship.
I'm glad I stuck with it, though. The examination of different kinds of motherhood, self-awareness and commitment deepened and resonated by the end. The insights into such diverse subjects as musical genius, filmmaking and editing, reality TV, radical wildlife conservation and more were all woven in absorbing and congruous fashion into what turned out to be a satisfying read.
Dual Citizens by Alix Ohlin might not have made the cut otherwise. By 50 pages, there were some moments laying out the lives of two contrasting but bonded sisters, told from the point of view of the elder sibling, that suggested more substance to come. Their mercurial and mystifying mother intermittently intrigued. But at that same juncture, nothing was gaining full emotional purchase, even though at that point, the narrator was experiencing the sundering of a then significant relationship.
I'm glad I stuck with it, though. The examination of different kinds of motherhood, self-awareness and commitment deepened and resonated by the end. The insights into such diverse subjects as musical genius, filmmaking and editing, reality TV, radical wildlife conservation and more were all woven in absorbing and congruous fashion into what turned out to be a satisfying read.
February 10, 2022
This was a quiet book which I attribute the description due to Lark, the protagonist and narrator, being a quiet person. I loved Lark. I feel like I could understand her. At times I remember thinking, we're the same person! But I definitely did not have it as hard and had a very blessed childhood in comparison.
This book played in my mind like an indie movie - Boyhood particularly. We just followed Lark's life and it was fascinating! I definitely couldn't recommend this book to people who don't like those kind of stories ... where I can't really tell you what the point was. Was it about her relationship with her sister? Her mother? Was it about her wanting and having a child? Yes but no ... It's the journey and it was heartfelt and touching and I wonder what happened next for them.
I do feel the book ended too abruptly. I think I was still expecting a beautiful paragraph on Robin or another mention of Wheelock. Or maybe I just want to know what happened with Catherine? I just feel like I needed one more thing but maybe that's how the author wanted it?
This book played in my mind like an indie movie - Boyhood particularly. We just followed Lark's life and it was fascinating! I definitely couldn't recommend this book to people who don't like those kind of stories ... where I can't really tell you what the point was. Was it about her relationship with her sister? Her mother? Was it about her wanting and having a child? Yes but no ... It's the journey and it was heartfelt and touching and I wonder what happened next for them.
I do feel the book ended too abruptly. I think I was still expecting a beautiful paragraph on Robin or another mention of Wheelock. Or maybe I just want to know what happened with Catherine? I just feel like I needed one more thing but maybe that's how the author wanted it?
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
September 19, 2020
In Dual Citizens we intermittently follow two sisters, Lark and Robin, from childhood to their late 30's. Their closeness is born from an inattentive, to the point of neglectful, mother which causes the girls to become each other's anchor. Both sisters have dual citizenship, the result of American fathers, and their lives move back and forth between Canada and the US.
Alix Ohlin explores fragmented mother/daughter relationships and sisterly bonds. The sisters end up on completely different paths, often puzzled by the other's choices.
This book hits a special reading place in my book loving heart where we are witnesses to intimate family moments and follow the trajectory of characters' lives. My first book by Alix Ohlin was a very enjoyable experience.
Alix Ohlin explores fragmented mother/daughter relationships and sisterly bonds. The sisters end up on completely different paths, often puzzled by the other's choices.
This book hits a special reading place in my book loving heart where we are witnesses to intimate family moments and follow the trajectory of characters' lives. My first book by Alix Ohlin was a very enjoyable experience.
August 9, 2020
This book about two sisters from separate fathers who share a close bond due to their Mother’s neglect really drew me in at first. As they improved their own lives by escaping later on, first the older, then the younger, I was also taken by the story and their courage. What was confusing and did not get fully resolved for me was the younger sister’s disappearance and subsequent anger at her older sister, and society, throughout the rest of the book that flares up. I was very drawn to the narrator, Lark, the older sister, in spite of all the quirks she felt she had, and the abuse she took from both her Mother and sister were devastating to read.
August 19, 2020
Well, I did not see that ending coming at all!
Beautifully written, great story lines, such a diverse group of friends each sister had and the interaction and indifference within each group was interesting as I thought the sisters tolerated each others friends in order that there was no friction amongst them all - the opposite to, I felt, between the sisters and their mother at any given time.
Well crafted characters of Lark, Robin and Marianne and their interactions with each other.
The two sisters were so very different from each other in personalities, the goals, dreams, inspirations were so vastly different, but in the end, their love for each other conquered all.
Beautifully written, great story lines, such a diverse group of friends each sister had and the interaction and indifference within each group was interesting as I thought the sisters tolerated each others friends in order that there was no friction amongst them all - the opposite to, I felt, between the sisters and their mother at any given time.
Well crafted characters of Lark, Robin and Marianne and their interactions with each other.
The two sisters were so very different from each other in personalities, the goals, dreams, inspirations were so vastly different, but in the end, their love for each other conquered all.
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