A review by xabbeylongx
One by Sarah Crossan

challenging emotional informative reflective sad medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

Spoilers Ahead: 
Wow. This book was absolutely stunning. A fantastic read, very very beautiful. 
We follow Grace, who is one of the conjoined twins, joined at the hip with Tippi. They get told that they have to go to school, a public school, which is their idea of hell. Bu they go, and they meet Yasmeen and Jon. 
Grace quickly falls for Jon, but because of her condition - and also the rule her sister made up - she can’t do anything about it. They have to go through school, and the stares and the name-calling, but at least they have new friends. But when their parents become jobless, they need to leave school - and they’ve already started enjoying it now! 
The twins do something they’ve always vowed not to do, and they sell their lives away to make a documentary, which gets them the money they need to continue going to school. But, when they collapse and wake up in hospital, they know that not everything is okay. 
Grace has a heart condition, and to live, they need to be separated. They don’t want this, but it’s their only chance at surviving. Grace’s chances of surviving are really low, anyway. She manages to get through the surgery, but when she wakes up, Tippi ins’t doing well. She hangs on to see Grace, who then tells her she can go, if she needs to, and Tippi passes away, having hung on enough to see Grace one last time (*sobs*). Grace promised Tippi that she would carry on for her, and that’s what she does. 
I loved everything about this book. Even the spaces between the text, I loved that too. It all contributed to the book, making the gaps between words longer to help the pacing and create tension, and it worked so well. The characters were beautiful, very realistic from a teenage-girl sort of perspective, especially with the two different personalities of Tippi and Grace, and hearing about the reality of conjoined twins, both physically and mentally, was a really big eye-opener, to be honest. I liked being able to learn more about a world that I haven’t experienced. Sobbed when Tippi passed. Especially when Grace told her that she should ‘Go’… absolutely bawling. The whole of this book is just beautifully melancholic, and I love the relationship between the two twins. It’s a must-read!! 
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