Anything written by my blogging colleague AMB is always worth reading. I therefore jumped into her debut novel with anticipation. Written in the first person Two Lovely Berries is the exploration by one half of a set of female twins of her relationship with both her sister and her wider family.

Both girls attend the same school and eventually the same college. They are close friends but the raconteur, Abigail, always looks to her marginally older sister Aubrey to lead and advise. When they eventually go their separate ways it is, almost inevitably, to hook up with a pair of brothers with both relations proving to be flawed. Abigail misses her sister badly but the reciprocity no longer seems to be there.

Dad is a workaholic and womaniser, Mum’s only ambition is to see her daughters happily married off.

Thoughtful and incisive, the author ensures the pages keep turning with her flowing style. There is always enough tension between the various parties to want to know how it’s all going to work out, for all of them. The narrator, Abigail, is a character that you root for even though she seems incapable of taking hard decisions without her sister by her side.

Relationship-driven, female readers in particular will like this story and empathise with the narrator.  I did find it rather one-paced, but indeed that is the essence of the Abigail character.

A very good debut novel and I look forward to more in the future.