Twin Truths by Jacqueline Sutherland  @writerjac @PointBlankCrime @RandomTTours

Source: Review copy
Publication:  6 April 2023 from Point Blank
PP: 288
ISBN-13: 978-0861544059

My thanks to Point Blank Crime and Random Things Tours for an advance copy for review

How well do your family really know you?

Belle can’t wait to finally have her twins all to herself after their first term at university. But when Kit unexpectedly brings back her boyfriend Ivo, Belle has to welcome him into their home. Charming and confident, Ivo soon wins over the family, but Belle can’t shake a strange feeling. And when Ivo reveals he knows a lot more about Belle than he first let on, she realises his intrusion into their lives could destroy everything she has built. How far is Belle willing to go to protect her family and herself?

I wish I hadn’t read this book, because then I could have taken it on holiday with me! This is perfect holiday reading. It is cleverly written and flows really well. The plotting is excellent – building up tension and creating a terrific atmosphere of suspicion and distrust all the way through the book right up to the nail-biting end.

Jacqueline Sutherland’s characters are well drawn and likeable and the suspense element is dark and compelling.

Set around the Christmas holidays, this domestic noir centres around Belle, the mother of twins Kit and Jess. The twins are back home to Southwold for the holidays – Jess from Exeter, Kit from Bristol. Kit has unexpectedly brought her new boyfriend Ivo, with her. There’s something about Ivo that disturbs Belle – a kind of familiarity to his dark, smouldering looks that causes a frisson within her. But he seems charming and very much in love with Kit and she is certainly smitten by him!

Belle is a wild swimmer and she swims in the chilly sea every morning, but nothing is quite as cold as the feeling she gets as she learns more about Ivo during his stay with the family.

Twin Truths is told in the present day with flashbacks to Belle’s past. As Kit and Ivo settle in, odd things start to happen and Belle suspects that Ivo has more to say than he is at first expressing. With one of her twins under his spell, Belle begins to realise that her family secrets are putting everything at risk.

Jacqueline Sutherland’s dark and propulsive thriller has a disquieting edge that kept me reading and as the pace picks up so does the action until it feels as if Belle is on a knife edge.

Verdict: Twin Truths is a well-paced read with great characters and a terrific, sinister plot which ends in a stunning denouement.  This is domestic noir that thrills and chills!

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