Hello, today I will be doing a book report on a book called Untwine. This is a great book written by Edwidge Danticat. She is the author of many award-winning books such as Eyes, and Breath. She lives in Miami, Florida and is African- American. She is also a National Book Award winner. She has 2 daughters and considers her home to be Haiti even though she resides in the United States.
This book is about two 16-year-old sisters called Giselle and Isabelle. They are identical twin sisters and are described to be 5”11. Giselle loves art and is captivated by anything colorful and beautiful. Isabelle though loves music and she plays the flute and does school concerts and wishes to one day become a famous singer. They are originally from Haiti, Africa but they live in Miami. Their family is described to be perfect and they are all very close but then their parents decided to divorce each other so that they can fulfill their dreams and continue their education. The book starts off with the sisters and their parents who are not speaking to each other in a car in the middle of traffic going to Isabelle’s concert. Isabelle is yelling at her dad to drive quicker and there is a lot of tension in the car between the parents and the two sisters. All of a sudden a red minivan hits the side of their car and repeatedly hits it. Isabelle bangs her head over and over against the window and her flute hits her as well. Isabelle was not wearing a seat belt so she was in the worst position in the car. The book continues with Giselle in the hospital confused about where she is and what is going on. Giselle cannot talk or move so we get to read her thoughts. She is thinking about her family and she thinks that maybe everyone else died. She has a feeling that Isabelle died but later says that if she had died then Giselle would have known because of some sisterly connection. The parents are in the adult’s section of the hospital and are also severely injured. Their friends and family come to meet them and talk to them. Giselle finds out through her aunt Leslie that Isabelle has died. Aunt Leslie is a very important character throughout the book. Giselle says that she was the only one who could understand the twins and she was like a friend to them. Aunt Leslie helped Giselle get past the incident and recover from it. She is extremely shocked and does not believe it until her sisters funeral which is later on in the book. The problem though is that everyone thinks that Giselle died and that Giselle is Isabelle. One day her parents come from the adult’s section to see Isabelle or actually Giselle. Her mother is talking to her and realizes that Giselle has a birthmark behind her ear that Isabelle had on the other ear. She insists that this is actually Giselle and after tests, they find out that she is actually Giselle. I cannot tell you anything else. The rest of the book really is about finding out how Giselle deals with her sister’s death and if the accident really was an accident after all. They make an important discovery about the person who had hit their car which leads them to think about that person and the accident in a totally different manner. Also, the accident broke up their family cause Isabelle died but it also kind of patched up their family as well since the parents are no longer considering divorce because of the situation.
This book is a science fiction book mainly because of the fact that it takes place in the real world but with a fake situation. Sci-Fi books sometimes also have political purposes and I cannot tell you how but this book has some talk of law and politics and human rights. Just like many sci-fi books, it opens up diverse and different situations for the reader. This book definitely gave me an inside glimpse of death and opened my mind to it.
Personally, I enjoyed this book a lot. It has a lot of details and descriptions. Giselle thoroughly describes how she feels about the situation and she says it feels as if she is underwater and she is trying hard to get back to the surface. The writing style was kind of different as well. It did not talk much about the present, instead, most of it was Giselle recalling memories that she made with Isabelle. Honestly, it did get a little boring at the beginning just because of the extent of details but as you read further into the book it gets more and more interesting. If I could change it I would talk a little bit more about the present moment. Also, the ending was a little bland and plain. I actually did not even know when it ended because there was no hint that the book was ending which a little was disappointing.
I would recommend this book to 14 and above since it has some inappropriate parts. Overall though it is easy to read and no difficult words. I would rate this book 4/5 because it was good but like I said before the ending should have been more dramatic.
Have you read this book? If so, how did you feel about it? What is your favorite book?
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