“1 August 2023 4:34 p.m. There were only five minutes left for Joy Moody and her twin daughters. They were ready, and expecting, to be gone at 4:39 p.m. exactly, and Joy was nothing if not exact. It was the first of August, and she had long been preparing Cassie and Annie for this moment: their twenty-first birthday and their return to 2050.”
Those are the opening lines to Kerryn Mayne’s newest novel Joy Moody Is Out of Time.
Joy was a social worker when she met the twins’ mother, Britney, a nineteen-year-old troubled teen. Britney gave birth to the twins in Joy’s home, walked away from them and soon after became a missing person.
Joy, who had always wanted to be a mother, never registered their births. She raised them in her laundromat, shielding them from anything to do with modern society. She convinced them that they were from the future and would return to 2050 on their twenty-first birthday to take their place in the future revolution.
She started spinning this tale when they were 10 and then didn’t know how to back out of it. The brain tumor that was growing in her head didn’t help. The laundromat is one in a line of businesses that includes a tattoo parlor, a locksmith, and an attorney’s office. Luckily for the twins, the owners of these businesses care about the trio and help the twins when Joy dies and a murder investigation ensues.
If you’re looking for a well-written story with a wacky mother, twins, supportive neighbors, and a mystery, then you must read Joy Moody Is Out of Time by Kerryn Mayne.
