Twins Jude and Noah are tell their stories at ages 13 and 16.
Noah is first as the storyteller when they are 13 years old. Jude is the
narrator three year later. The family dynamic is complex between the twins
themselves, and each with their parents.
They have a strong bond, Jude and Noah, which, over time, unravels, and
is close to crumbling as they encounter and act upon unexpected and difficult
circumstances. What starts with sibling competition turns into more then they
each can handle. At the same time, they
must deal with being a teenager in their own ways, and in their determination
to love and hate each other, Noah and Jude make choices that alienate, and even
isolate, their twin sibling. Much of this realistic-fiction novel was fast-paced, creative, and engaging. The novel handles an array of topics– family, school, coming-of-age, sexual identity, death, forgiveness – maybe almost too much and there is a lot of tension between the twins. What they do to each other is mean and certainly life-altering. While everything is possible, especially in fiction, these actions seemed a little too much.
I enjoyed reading through Noah. I looked forward to Jude; however, what Jude
does to forgive herself and make amends with her mother, and maybe even Noah,
seemed like a dis-jointed plot line that just didn’t fit. This
was a good portion of the second-half of the book, and I found myself eager to
get past those parts and into the Jude-Noah dynamic and final resolution.
