Take two is a random collection of incidents from the U.K. childhoods of two sisters, Caroline and Vivian Thonger. Vivian now lives in Aotearoa, New Zealand. Take two is like a catalogue of memories, complete with illustrations of remembered artefacts. The reader pieces together the sisters’ histories, their fears, their celebrations, their horrors, and the intergenerational effects of wartime trauma.

Take Two reminded me of Frankie McMillan’s My mother and the Hungarians, a collection of short, short stories about the Hungarian refugee experience in New Zealand in the 1950s – each story complete but jointly forming a narrative. Similarly, with Take two, the reader enjoys little gems of writing, which together form the, probably not always reliable, story of two sisters growing up in a dysfunctional family.

The forms the snippets take vary; prose, poetry, letters, menus, even scenes from plays – echoing the fragmented selections of memory. Some of the pieces are given a ‘soundtrack’, just as many of our memories are pulled forth by hearing a piece of music of their time. We read descriptions of properties the girls were moved to, of relatives the girls encountered, of trips the girls went on, their first dates, their major concerts, their intrepid OEs …

As we read, we also learn of the sisters’ relatives and their burdens, illnesses, and idiosyncrasies – Take two is as much their story as it is that of Caroline and Vivien – their daughters, nieces, granddaughters. It is a messy collection, incomplete but full. It is a great evoking of memory, and how it can make inconsequential things momentous, and momentous things just part of our remembered lives. I really enjoyed reading, and worrying about, the Thonger sisters.