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A review by reader_fictions
The Third Twin by Ken Follett
3.0
When I was in high school, I really loved Ken Follett’s books. I read a whole bunch of them, and The Third Twin was one of my personal favorites. When it popped up in the PRH audiobook reviewer email, since it’s only just getting an audiobook, I decided the time to reread had come. As expected, The Third Twin was nowhere near as good as I remembered, but it wasn’t awful, so I guess this is a win?
For a book written in the late nineties by a white male author about rape culture, The Third Twin‘s remarkably okay. It gets a bit preachy and overt with its messages, but Follett does get the messages across for the most part. Racism and sexism are clearly addressed, though of course the main characters are all white. The most problematic element for me was that Jeannie refused to believe her friend when she asserted that Steve was the man who raped her; Jeannie disagreed because of his psychological profile but that wasn’t enough without further evidence. There’s been much better stuff written on rape culture since, but, given the era it appeared in, I was surprised it wasn’t a complete offensive mess.
I also give Follett credit for being somewhat decent at writing women. There’s definitely some creepy sexualization, but he does avoid turning them all into MPDGs and they do have varied interests. Again, my feelings are mixed here, and I could have done without the constant reminders about how incredibly hot Jeannie is, but it wasn’t totally atrocious. In high school, I very much shipped Jeannie and Steve, but as an adult I’m seriously puzzled by it. Apparently as a kid, I was a lot more trusting or something. Or maybe I was just really hard up for good ships. *shrug*
The best/worst part of The Third Twin is how hilariously dated it is. There’s a lot of explanation of the internet, floppy disks, and praise of Jeannie’s program that can scan basic data. This is an excellent example of why authors don’t often write books that are on the cutting edge of technology. The nature versus nurture idea is an interesting one, and Follett conveys a concept for readers who aren’t especially educated. If you’re more knowledgeable in this arena, there’s a lot of lecturing.
Plot-wise, another bit of hilarity is that the big twist is given away in the title. Maybe they did that so that it would be more acceptable that Jeannie doesn’t believe her friend? Because the readers all know that there’s a third twin who is most likely the rapist? Who the fuck knows tbh, but I’ll be over here laughing about the title for ages.
I will not be reading The Third Twinagain. Three stars is over-generous, but LaVoy did a nice job with her narration and I’m adding in half a nostalgia point. Also, it was better than I was expecting, which makes me feel kindly disposed to it. However, I wouldn’t really recommend picking this one up; there are better, more current books on these subjects.
For a book written in the late nineties by a white male author about rape culture, The Third Twin‘s remarkably okay. It gets a bit preachy and overt with its messages, but Follett does get the messages across for the most part. Racism and sexism are clearly addressed, though of course the main characters are all white. The most problematic element for me was that Jeannie refused to believe her friend when she asserted that Steve was the man who raped her; Jeannie disagreed because of his psychological profile but that wasn’t enough without further evidence. There’s been much better stuff written on rape culture since, but, given the era it appeared in, I was surprised it wasn’t a complete offensive mess.
I also give Follett credit for being somewhat decent at writing women. There’s definitely some creepy sexualization, but he does avoid turning them all into MPDGs and they do have varied interests. Again, my feelings are mixed here, and I could have done without the constant reminders about how incredibly hot Jeannie is, but it wasn’t totally atrocious. In high school, I very much shipped Jeannie and Steve, but as an adult I’m seriously puzzled by it. Apparently as a kid, I was a lot more trusting or something. Or maybe I was just really hard up for good ships. *shrug*
The best/worst part of The Third Twin is how hilariously dated it is. There’s a lot of explanation of the internet, floppy disks, and praise of Jeannie’s program that can scan basic data. This is an excellent example of why authors don’t often write books that are on the cutting edge of technology. The nature versus nurture idea is an interesting one, and Follett conveys a concept for readers who aren’t especially educated. If you’re more knowledgeable in this arena, there’s a lot of lecturing.
Plot-wise, another bit of hilarity is that the big twist is given away in the title. Maybe they did that so that it would be more acceptable that Jeannie doesn’t believe her friend? Because the readers all know that there’s a third twin who is most likely the rapist? Who the fuck knows tbh, but I’ll be over here laughing about the title for ages.
I will not be reading The Third Twinagain. Three stars is over-generous, but LaVoy did a nice job with her narration and I’m adding in half a nostalgia point. Also, it was better than I was expecting, which makes me feel kindly disposed to it. However, I wouldn’t really recommend picking this one up; there are better, more current books on these subjects.