Korede is a nurse. She’s meticulous, clean, and carries a bottle of bleach like a holy relic. This isn't because she's a germaphobe, though. It’s because her sister, Ayoola, has a nasty habit of killing her boyfriends. This is the dark, dry, and surprisingly hilarious premise of My Sister the Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite, a book that managed to turn the bloody streets of Lagos into a playground for a sibling rivalry unlike anything else in modern literature.
Most people pick this up expecting a standard thriller. They want a "whodunnit." But Braithwaite isn't interested in that. We already know who did it. The mystery isn't the murder; it’s the loyalty.
How much can you actually love someone who is objectively a monster?
It’s a short book. Punchy. You can finish it in a single afternoon, but the questions it leaves you with regarding family obligation and the "pretty privilege" Ayoola enjoys will stick around much longer. It’s basically a masterclass in tension and satire, wrapped in a bright yellow cover that looks way more cheerful than the contents actually are.
The Lagos You Don't See in Travel Brochures
Braithwaite sets her story in the heart of Nigeria’s largest city. But this isn't the Lagos of glossy high-rises or poverty porn. It’s a middle-class, suffocatingly social world where appearance is everything. In My Sister the Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite, the setting acts as a secondary antagonist. The heat, the traffic, and the constant digital ping of social media notifications create a pressure cooker.
Ayoola is the "beautiful" one. In Lagos society, as portrayed here, that beauty is a shield. When she kills a man, she doesn't go to jail; she goes to Instagram and posts a photo of her lunch. People like her too much to suspect her.
Korede, the plain, hardworking sister, is the one scrubbing the blood out of the floorboards. She is the invisible labor that keeps Ayoola’s life from falling apart. It’s a biting commentary on how society forgives the attractive and overlooks the useful.
Think about it. If Ayoola were "ugly," this would be a horror story. Because she's stunning, it's a "problem" Korede has to fix. The irony is thick enough to choke on.
Why the Characters Break Every Thriller Rule
Most thrillers rely on the protagonist trying to catch the killer. Here, the protagonist is the accomplice. Korede is deeply relatable, which is a terrifying thing to admit. Who hasn't felt the burden of a family member who just takes and takes?
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Ayoola is fascinating because she’s almost childlike. She doesn't seem to have a moral compass. She kills Femi, her boyfriend, and her first concern isn't the body—it’s that she’s hungry. She’s a sociopath, sure, but she’s a charming one. Braithwaite doesn't give us some deep, traumatic backstory to explain her away. She just is.
Then there’s Tade.
Tade is the doctor Korede is secretly in love with. He’s kind, he’s handsome, and he represents the "good life" Korede wants. But then he meets Ayoola. And just like every other man, he falls under her spell. This is where the book stops being a dark comedy and starts being a tragedy.
You feel Korede's heart break. It’s not just that her sister is a murderer; it’s that her sister is stealing the one piece of light she had.
- Korede: The enabler. The nurse. The one with the bleach.
- Ayoola: The narcissist. The favorite child. The girl with the knife.
- The Father: A shadow over the whole book. His past abuse is the glue that binds the sisters together in a toxic, unbreakable knot.
The "Pretty Privilege" Debate
Let's be honest about something. My Sister the Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite is a direct attack on how we perceive victims and villains.
In the real world, we see this all the time. True crime fans obsess over "hot" convicts. Social media influencers get away with "cancelable" offenses because they have a specific look. Braithwaite just takes that reality to its logical, murderous extreme.
Ayoola is the ultimate influencer. Even when she’s being investigated, she’s more worried about her follower count than the police. And the police? They're more interested in her smile than her story. It’s frustrating. It’s supposed to be.
A Style That Cuts Like a Knife
The prose is incredibly sparse. Braithwaite doesn't use three words when one will do. The chapters are short—some are only a page or two. This mimics the frantic, heartbeat-skipping anxiety that Korede feels.
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There is no fluff. No "in today's landscape" filler. Just blood, bleach, and the hum of the Nigerian night.
What Most Reviews Miss About the Ending
People often complain that the ending feels abrupt. They want a big trial. They want justice.
But justice would ruin the point.
The book is called My Sister the Serial Killer, not How I Put My Sister in Jail. The ending is a realization. Korede understands that she is trapped. She is the keeper of the secrets, and those secrets have become her cage. It’s a bleak realization that blood is thicker than water, but it's also thicker than morality, law, and personal happiness.
If you’re looking for a hero, you’re reading the wrong book. If you’re looking for a survival story, you’ve found it.
Comparisons You Might Not Have Considered
A lot of people compare this to Dexter, but that’s a lazy comparison. Dexter is about a man with a "code." Ayoola has no code. She has impulses.
It’s actually much closer to Fleabag if Fleabag had a body count. It has that same Fourth-Wall-breaking feel where the narrator is looking at you, exhausted, asking, "Can you believe this?"
It also shares DNA with Parasite, the film. It’s about the invisible people who clean up the messes of the beautiful and the rich.
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Actionable Takeaways for Your Next Read
If you’re diving into My Sister the Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite, or if you just finished it and your head is spinning, here is how to actually digest what you just read.
First, look at the flashbacks. The scenes with their father are the only way to understand why Korede doesn't just call the cops. They learned early on that the world is dangerous and that they only have each other. Loyalty wasn't a choice; it was a survival tactic.
Second, pay attention to the objects. The knife. The bleach. The car. Braithwaite uses these items to tell the story of the girls' power dynamics.
Next Steps for Readers:
- Read between the lines of the humor: The book is funny until it isn't. Ask yourself why you're laughing at a man being stabbed in the heart. That’s Braithwaite’s trap.
- Explore the Nigerian Noir genre: If you liked the vibe, look for authors like Femi Kayode or Leye Adenle. Lagos is a goldmine for gritty, smart crime fiction.
- Analyze the "Why": Why does Korede keep cleaning? Is it love, or is it a need for control? Most experts in psychological fiction argue it’s the latter. Cleaning is the only thing Korede can control in a world where her sister is a walking chaos agent.
Don't go into this expecting a traditional thriller. It’s a satire. It’s a family drama. It’s a very messy, very bloody look at what it means to be a "good sister."
Braithwaite didn't write a book about murder; she wrote a book about the lengths we go to to keep our families intact, even when they’re rotting from the inside out. It's brilliant. It's mean. You'll love it.
To fully appreciate the nuance of the story, revisit the scenes where Korede is at the hospital. Her professional life as a nurse—saving lives—is the direct inverse of her home life. This duality is what makes the book a masterpiece of character study.
Check out Braithwaite’s short stories if you want more of this specific, biting tone. She has a way of capturing the absurdities of modern life that few other contemporary writers can match.