The ties that bind us together  and those that tear us apart  is the theme threaded throughout this visceral, evocative debut novel. Survival is all on the remote island inhabited by both humans and the supernatural, on whose perilous shores ropes writhe like snakes. The narrative skilfully oscillates between two first-person voices: Mary, an islander with a distinctive creole dialect (family are "belonging people"), and Morgan, an outsider whose parents have fled there to begin life anew, but who dreams of returning to "the mainland". Initially strangers, the girls' lives become poignantly plaited together.

Maternal bonds cruelly sundered are tenderly depicted in this novel of "broken lost things", for 16-year-old Mary's family struggle to make ends meet since the death of "Mam", who left behind threads and linens from which her daughter makes "broideries" to sell  the only contact with the outside world is with sinister tradesmen. One day Mary's little brother Barney vanishes mysteriously, leaving "a blank hole in the world". Mary's "unravelling" is vividly conjured as she searches for him ("There's one thread I dun want to cut. The one between me and Barney"), a search unfolding her own buried traumatic memories of sexual violence.

Strangulating family ties are what Morgan yearns to escape. She is kept hostage by her father, the island's undertaker, and her mother who is "skittering in madness". Stories are Morgan's imaginative escape but also become the place of "painful secrets". In their quest for Barney  and the island's brutal truth hidden in the Weaving Rooms and Thrashing House  the girls must discern between the real and make-believe, in pages woven with witches, phantoms and folktales and haunted by the influence of Angela Carter and Margaret Atwood.

The author becomes tangled in a melodramatic plot whose loose ends are too neatly tied  and tidied  to feel credible. Far better is the powerful patterning of poetic imagery and rich tapestry of metaphor. This novel filled with weavers and embroiderers creatively explores how much we can craft our own life stories: "I want to cut and rip and unpick all the days what've gone, thread them back together so them're made all over again," laments Mary.

Jess Richards spins a memorable yarn about how "escape is possible, even from the darkest places". Indeed, it's when characters summon the courage to snip away harmful ties that this tale tugs tenaciously at the heartstrings.