Past, Present and Future?

Review of 'Twenties Girl', a novel by Sophie Kinsella

The Plot

Lara Lington is the main character of this novel.
Lara's life is in turmoil, on paper and according to what her family believe, Lara should be doing well. She is in business with her best friend Natalie, the pair run a supposedly upmarket, head hunting recruitment agency. In reality, Lara has been dumped by her boyfriend Josh, has indulged in a spot of stalking and harassment of Josh, her business partner has failed to return from a holiday in Goa where she has fallen in love with a local, leaving Lara to hold the fort.

Lara knows next to nothing about head-hunting or recruitment and whilst she is trying her best, the business is failing dismally. Lara's personal life is in shreds and her finances are looking decidedly grim.
Lara's great aunt Sadie has passed away aged 105. Sadie Lancaster had lived in a nursing home for many years and was all but forgotten by the her small family, which consists of nephews Bill and Michael (Lara's father) their respective wives and the three children the brothers have between them. No one had visited Sadie for many years and when the family get together for Sadie's funereal no one has organised flowers or spoken to the vicar about an eulogy.

Lara's uncle, Bill Lington, is the world famous boss of Lington's coffee, a coffee franchise and the millionaire author of 'Two Little Coins', a motivational, self help business guide which tells of his rise to fortune by means of his own hard work. In comparison, Lara's parents feel like the poor relations and Lara and her sister are somewhat overawed by their uncle, his perma-tanned wife and their spoiled cousin, Diamanté.
As the funeral progresses, Lara becomes aware of a presence, a disturbingly persistent presence, who tells her to stop the funeral. At first she ignores this presence, putting it down to stress or an over active imagination, but eventually begins to see the speaker, a young woman, dressed in the fashions of the 1920s. Lara realises that the girl is ghost, but no ordinary ghost, this is the ghost of her great aunt Sadie. Sadie has chosen to reveal herself as she was in the happiest period of her long life.

At Sadie's insistence, Lara makes a feeble attempt to halt the proceedings but fails. The young woman tells her to say that Sadie Lancaster was murdered. Naturally the funeral is halted, the police are called and Lara descends into a spiral of madcap events.
Her life is taken over by the ensuing situations and it seems that all is not well within the Lington brothers families. Lara delves to get to the bottom of the questions posed by Great Aunt Sadie and as a result uncovers family scandals and mysteries.

Will Lara resolve the Lington family mystery and reveal the long hidden secrets?
You'll have to read the novel if you want to know more!

My Thoughts and Conclusion

As many readers may know, Sophie Kinsella is a well known chick-lit author, she penned the immensely popular 'Shopaholic' series. I have to be honest and say that her writing style in these books was not really to my taste and as a result, she is an author that I have tended to ignore. That opinion has changed with 'Twenties Girl'. The book was given to me in a batch of books that I received from a local free cycle site. I wavered as to whether I should simply pass it on, but on reading the book synopsis decided to give it a try.
I am so glad I did!

The novel is a brilliant piece of writing in my opinion. Yes, it is chick-lit and yes, it is fluffy and light-hearted in places, but the strong story line and amusing characters make this novel highly entertaining and readable. The dialogue is witty, sharp and amusing, the characters are believable and well rounded.
Over and above the chick-lit essence of the novel, is a strong story line with many twists and turns. The drama begins to unfold from the very first chapter and the book had me hooked from the start. Admittedly, I am a very fast reader, but I had this book read in two sittings, I just couldn't put it down!

I particularly liked the way the ghost of great Aunt Sadie tried to get Lara to embrace the whole 1920's lifestyle, she was furious when Lara wouldn't smoke or go out dancing. The character of Lara was very well drawn, a thoroughly modern young lady of our times, who had to accept and embrace her own personal ghostly friend, even though she was not spiritually minded at all.
I feel that Twenties Girl is a typical 'good over bad' or perhaps I should say a 'nice girl going a bit wrong, but turns out all right in the end', modern novel!

I really enjoyed this book, in spite of not really liking other novels by this author. I may just grab a few copies of her other work to compare on the strength of the enjoyment I got from this novel.
I would recommend this novel to others, it is a fast paced read with lots of twists and turns along the way.
Thank you for reading

©brittle1906
N.B. My reviews may appear on other sites under the same user name.

Jail Bird, a brilliant novel by Jessie Keane

Review of Jail Bird, a novel by Jessie Keane
I am reviewing the paperback version of this book, published by Harper Books in 2010, 421 pages, ISBN 97800007908841. Cover price £7.99. Genre:- Crime.


This novel can be found in High street book stores or online. Amazon are currently offering it from £2.42 + P&P new or from 0.01p used.



Synopsis

The plot begins in the mid 1990's. Blonde and beautiful Lily King is the wife of Leo King, a well known hard man and head of the notorious Essex gangland King family. Lily has a good life, Leo treats her well, she lives in a beautiful home, has two daughters, Saz and Oli. The family has plenty of money, Lily spends her time lunching with friends, caring for her home and family, her life is far removed from her humble upbringing with her postman father and cleaner mother.


There is a blot on Lily's horizon, she discovers that Leo is having an affair with the wife of his company accountant, Adrienne. She worries over this news and during a girls only break with her friends, her mood becomes worse and she decides to confront Leo about his infidelity. Lily leaves the spa hotel and returns home early in order to speak to her husband, however on arrival at home, Lily discovers Leo dead. He has been shot through the head.


The plot then fast forwards by 12 years to find Lily being released from prison. Lily has served a sentence for the murder of Leo King. Her friend Beck collects her and agrees that Lily can stay with her for a while.

Prison has changed Lily, she is no longer the quiet little housewife, she has toughened up and she is out for revenge, someone killed her husband and she wants to find them. Her husband's brothers Si and Freddy are also out for revenge as they feel Lily has not paid a high enough price for killing Leo.


Apart from Beck, all Lily's friends have snubbed her, her daughters have been taken care of by the King brothers and are lost to her, her lovely home has been made over to the girls, as a criminal cannot prosper from their crime. Lily has nothing and no one to turn to.


The final straw for Lily is when Becks let slip that Lily's eldest child, 21 year old Saz is to be married the following day. Lily gatecrashes the wedding and is devastated when she realises the level of hatred her daughters and her former friends have for her. Even Beck is forced to ask Lily to leave after her appearance at the wedding.


Lily is plunged into the depths of despair and she vows to clear her name and find Leo's murderer. Her efforts open a can of worms that forces her to accept that people are not always what they seem and even those closest to her have their own agendas.


My Thoughts and Conclusion

I had not read any of Jessie Keane's novel before, however as a fan of female crime writers, Martina Cole and Mandasue Heller, I was interested to see that the author was recommended as a similar writer to them and bought the novel on the strength of this.


Jail Bird is a gritty novel with a riveting storyline. I found the writing style to be very similar to the authors mentioned above, the dialogue is very strong, with some extremely ripe language, but sharply delivered and it is relevant to the story line. The main character of Lily King is superbly drawn, believable and a very strong woman. I particularly liked this character and felt the author lead her through some truly awful situations, without losing sight of the basically 'nice' person beneath the hard woman. I found myself in tears when Lily's eldest daughter turns on her and tells her she will never forgive her.


The plot is an intricate one of intrigue, secrets and surprises. I was impressed by the well written story line and found that I was hooked from page one, this book is a real page turner and there were enough plot twists and turns to keep my interest throughout.


There are some scenes of violence and whilst these are relevant to the plot, in my opinion, they are not gratuitous or described in too much graphic detail. As mentioned earlier in the review, in places, the language used between characters is very strong and if you are offended by this, it might be better to avoid this genre of novel! After all, would a gangland boss be describing his brother's murderer in anything but bad language?


I will look out for more by this author, I feel she is serious rival to Martina Cole and would recommend Jail Bird to others who enjoy a crime novel with strong females characters.


I am awarding this book a 5* rating.


Thank you for reading.


© brittle1906 January 2012.


N.B. My novels may be found on other sites under the same user name.