You love 'em, no matter what.
"WHY DID I EVER ASK FOR A SISTER!"
— Raina's reaction to her sister's teasing about "The Incident"
Sisters is the 2014 interquel/sequel to Smile by Raina Telgemeier, and deals primarily with Raina(born 26/5/1977)'s relationship to her sister, Amara(born 10/1/1982). The story is written against the backdrop of a road trip (there's a quick panel in Smile which unintentionally foreshadows this) before Raina goes to high school. While the two fight and bicker initially, they begin to realize that they need each other more than they initially thought.
Followed by Guts, which is a prequel to both Smile and Sisters.
Sisters provides examples of:
- Annoyingly Repetitive Child: At one point, Amara plays an audiobook version of Bambi so many times. Raina groans loudly in annoyance, only for Amara to shush her.
- Art Evolution: Not only are the character designs more consistent this time around, but the colors are slightly cooler and deeper and all the text is typed.
- Artistic License – Animal Care: Denis puts a bunch of crickets in a terrarium with Leland the Chameleon. And the crickets ate him instead. Truth in Television - Crickets can actually kill lizards in large enough numbers!
- Autobiography: The second in Raina's Smile series, about her rocky relationship with her sister Amara and how it culminated during a road trip.
- Bittersweet Ending: Raina and Amara are starting to become closer together! And Mango is alive! Great! Oh wait, their parents' marriage is fraying and the two aren't happy together. Oh.
- In real life, the Telgemeier parents divorced five years after the events of Sisters and are Amicable Exes.
- Brutal Honesty: Of the Innocently Insensitive kind. When arguing over each other's fishes' flaws, Raina casually points out:Young Raina: Your fish is dead.
Young Amara: AAAAAAA~ - Darker and Edgier: The story is a mature look at the two sister's relationship and depicts a failing marriage, whereas Smile is slightly more comedic and is more about Raina discovering who she is as a person.
- Deliberate Values Dissonance: Sue leaves Raina and Amara in a car alone for several hours in the Arizona (?) desert. This was more acceptable in the early 1990s, when the story is set, but would be looked upon more harshly nowadays. To her credit, Sue does regret treating her daughters this way.
- The Glorious War of Sisterly Rivalry: Invoked when her little sister Amara starts growing up, but even before then, the sisters often argued and fought.
- Meaningful Name: While Amara means “immortal” and “love”, it also means “bitter one” in Latin. Amara is bitter about her place in the family and her bad relationship with Raina.
- Middle Child Syndrome: Amara, big time.
- Opposites Attract: Raina's parents. Her mom is a hippie Granola Girl who picks 'meaningful' names for her children ("Raina" because she was born while it was raining, "Amara" because it means "immortal" in Sanskrit and "love" in Latin, and "Will" because it was God's will that she have a son). Her dad, on the other hand, is a fairly straight-laced computer programmer who works a 9-to-5 job.
- Siblings Wanted: In a 1981 flashback, Raina is seen in this phase as a child before Amara was born.
- Sweet and Sour Grapes: Amara gave Raina fresh batteries for her walkman after they work together to capture Mango. Even though it meant her sister would crawl back into her metaphorical shell that is her walkman, Amara still honors her agreement. She's pleasantly surprised when Raina doesn't put her walkman back on, and instead interacts with Amara, something she greatly appreciates.
- Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Raina is terrified of snakes, and does not react well when Amara gets a pet corn snake for her birthday one year.
- World of Snark: Replace "world" with "family" and it works perfectly. Both Amara and Raina can be pretty wry at times.
