Apart from telling a poignant story about two siblings, Brother & Sister is a fascinating exercise in writing a personal and methodical tale about someone who has come to feel, in some sense, like a stranger.

... there’s no tentative toe-testing. From page one, Keaton dives deep into a pool of regret about her relationship with her mentally ill younger brother, Randy Hall.

Brother & Sister ruminates on the mysteries that shape us—nurture or nature, volition or destiny. Disassembling the family narrative, Keaton asks big questions, bracing for the discomfort they provoke.

This must have been a very difficult book for actress Diane Keaton to write.

In an effort to seek understanding of his struggles, Keaton eloquently and unflinchingly examines her brother’s life, drawing from excerpts of his poetry and her mother’s journals and letters in an attempt to find answers to her questions. The result is a cohesive, honest look at an entire family impacted by a troubled individual, as well as how Keaton maintained a bond with her sibling despite tremendous challenges.

Keaton thoughtfully wrestles with her guilty conscience while attempting to assemble a clearer picture of her brother’s nature. To do so, she relies heavily on excerpts from his poems, prose, and letters and those of family members. Yet Hall—described variously as 'a schizoid personality' by a doctor, an 'Almost Artist' by Keaton, and a 'genius' by his idealizing mother—remains inscrutable and difficult to sympathize with.

... [a] resonant and melancholy family memoir.