A rollicking read.
Identical twins have long been a source of great material for the writers of crime thrillers. They even crop up in real-life crimes where the wrong twin is caught through DNA. Debut novelist Rose Carlyle has developed her characters as mirror-twins. These are twins which have divided later than standard identicals, but not late enough to be co-joined. As a consequence, they are mirror images of each other, which in rare cases includes internal organs.
Iris Carmichael has always felt in her sister Summer’s shadow. Summer is the sweet one that everyone adores. Iris is cynical and much less popular. She is also somewhat jealous of Summer’s marriage to the gorgeous Seychellois Adam, and their purchase of the beloved family yacht, Bathsheba.
Their multi-millionaire father has died, leaving a very specific will in which the whole of his fortune will go to the first child who marries and then has a child. The twins are the eldest out of a range of half-siblings left behind by their lothario father, so one of them will most likely inherit: if they can produce a child. Carlyle cleverly puts both sisters alone on Bathsheba and sails them across the Indian Ocean.
The Girl in the Mirror has all the plot elements to make a good thriller: sibling rivalry; a bizarre will; exotic locations; a messy family. She delivers these in a first-person narrative, told by Iris.
This is certainly a novel which grabs the reader from the beginning and moves at good pace, keeping the tension taut, whilst taking enough time to build character and setting. Being a sailor herself, Carlyle writes particularly well around Bathsheba and the Indian Ocean crossing. There is the obligatory (although fairly predictable) twist, and enough interesting secondary characters, although some of these seem under-used in narrative terms. The plotting is only spoiled by a somewhat unbelievable climax, and a denouement which seems messy and unfinished.
However, despite these disappointments, The Girl in the Mirror still delivers for the lover of the psychological thriller and has already been snapped up for movie rights.
With two beautiful sisters, a gorgeous yacht, and the Indian Ocean, it should translate well to the screen.
Reviewed by Tracey Korsten
Twitter: @TraceyKorsten
Distributed by: Allen & Unwin
Released: August 2020
RRP: $29.99
More News
