Twenties Girl: A rare connection

Actually, we were discussing the lead character of Sophie Kinsella's Can You Keep a Secret?

Known as the author of the bestselling Shopaholic novels, Kinsella's strength lies in making her characters so believable that it is easy to think of them as real people. Written in a warm, breezy style, all her books are page-turners.

It is a pity chick-lit is not considered serious fiction as her books are enormously entertaining and uplifting.

With Twenties Girl, Kinsella attempts her first "ghost story" by creating a ghost as the second main character. The book is about a rare friendship that blossoms between a twentysomething, modern girl Lara Lington and Sadie Lancaster, a 1920s feisty, fun, glamorous girl who enjoys dancing and getting her own way.

Sincere and a little naïve, Lara is in big trouble. After chucking her job, she pours all her savings into setting up a headhunting company with her best friend. Lara, who hopes to learn the skills of headhunting from Natalie, is left high and dry when her new business partner indefinitely extends her holiday in Goa after falling in love with a beach bum.

While struggling to steady the floundering business, Lara is also nursing a broken heart as her "perfect" boyfriend Josh "broke things off with no warning, no talking, no discussion".

As if this wasn't enough, her parents insist that she come along to the funeral of her great-aunt Sadie Lancaster who passed away at the age of 105 in a nursing home.

Only six people are present at the funeral: Lara, her parents, uncle Bill (the Bill Langton, who started Lingtons Coffee from nothing at the age of 26 and built it up into a worldwide empire of coffee shops), his wife Trudy and their daughter Diamante.

Five minutes into the service, Lara tunes out the vicar's monotonous voice only to hear someone whispering urgently in her ear. "Where's my necklace? I need it."

It is the ghost of Sadie.

Lara thinks she is hallucinating but the vision is insistent.

Sadie can't rest until her missing necklace — two rows of glass beads with rhinestones in between and a dragonfly in the centre — is found.

Bullied by her incessant shrieks, which no one else notices, and much to the shock of her concerned family, Lara calls a halt to the funeral to buy time to locate the missing piece of jewellery.

The verbal sparring between the odd couple is delightful as they embark on an intriguing search to find Sadie's necklace.

In the process, Sadie helps Lara take control of her life, get over Josh, find a new romance and learn to appreciate family values.

Although a tad disappointing as the plot meanders a bit, Twenties Girl is amusing, cute and silly.

Twenties GirlBy Sophie Kinsella, Dial Press, 435 pages, $20