Title: One
Author: Sarah Crossan
Genre: Poetry | YA
Format: Paperback
Length: 434 pages
Publisher: Bloomsbury Children’s
Publication Date: 15th September 2015
My Rating: ★★★★★ (5 stars)
Goodreads | Storygraph
Book: One
Author: Sarah Crossan
Format: Paperback
Pages: 434
Publisher: Bloomsbury Children’s
My Rating: ★★★★★
Synopsis:
Grace and Tippi don’t like being stared and sneered at, but they’re used to it. They’re conjoined twins – united in blood and bone.
What they want is to be looked at in turn, like they truly are two people. They want real friends. And what about love?
But a heart-wrenching decision lies ahead for Tippi and Grace. One that could change their lives more than they ever asked for…
My Review:
This is my story.
It is a single story,
not two tales tangled up in each other
like lover’s limbs,
as you might expect.
This was my first novel by Sarah Crossan. I didn’t expect to love this novel as much as I did.
One is a wonderful story about conjoined twins, Grace and Tippi. They are best friends as well as sisters. This story shows the reader how they must leave their sheltered home-school world and enter public school – with curious students and constant stares. It is very easy to get invested in these girls and see them as individuals as opposed to twins.
One only took me a few hours to read and wow, we get to see these girls go through some difficult decisions and struggles. Not only do we see their struggle, we see that of their younger sister, Dragon. I looked at Dragon’s side storyline closely and what I saw was a girl who was going through her own troubles but was probably overlooked due to what was happening with the twins. I felt that this was an important message that Crossan was getting across – whether intentional or not.
This book is written in a unique format. This book is written in narrative verse format. I loved the way that she set out on the poems and a friend pointed out to me a reason behind a certain formatting choice.
This book wasn’t about sensationalising conjoined twins. I felt that Crossan treated her character with love and sensitivity and behind everything that happened in the books – the central theme of it was love – a love for someone who is literally a part of you.
This novel is thought-provoking and touching and I felt for the struggle these characters had. The ending was sad and shows how cruel life can be, I felt that One truly captured that.
It’s an emotional read, but I would read it again and again.
