Untwine

by Edwidge Danticat

Overview

A haunting and mesmerizing story about sisterhood, family, love, and loss by literary luminary Edwidge Danticat.

Giselle Boyer and her identical twin, Isabelle, are as close as sisters can be, even as their family seems to be unraveling. Then the Boyers have a tragic encounter that will shatter everyone's world forever.

Giselle wakes up in the hospital, injured and unable to speak or move. Trapped in the prison of her own body, Giselle must revisit her past in order to understand how the people closest to her — her friends, her parents, and above all, Isabelle, her twin — have shaped and defined her. Will she allow her love for her family and friends to lead her to recovery? Or will she remain lost in a spiral of longing and regret?

Untwine is a spellbinding tale, lyrical and filled with love, mystery, humor, and heartbreak. Award-winning author Edwidge Danticat brings her extraordinary talent to this graceful and unflinching examination of the bonds of friendship, romance, family, the horrors of loss, and the strength we must discover in ourselves when all seems hopeless.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780545423045
Publisher:	Scholastic, Inc.
Publication date:	01/31/2017
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	320
Sales rank:	172,205
Product dimensions:	5.20(w) x 7.90(h) x 0.70(d)
Lexile:	920L (what's this?)
Age Range:	12 - 18 Years

About the Author

Edwidge Danticat is the author of many award-winning books, including Breath, Eyes, Memory, an Oprah's Book Club pick; Krik? Krak!, a National Book Award nominee; The Farming of Bones, an American Book Award Winner; and Brother, I'm Dying, a National Book Critics Circle winner. She is also a recipient of a MacArthur Genius Grant. Edwidge lives with her family in Miami, Florida.

Read an Excerpt

From UNTWINEPeople say that things like this happen in slow motion, as though you suddenly become an astronaut in the anti gravity chamber of your own life. This wasn't true for me. Things were speeding up instead and I did my best to slow them down in my mind. Mom was still screaming our names, taking turns calling Isabelle and me by both our proper names and our nicknames: Isabelle, Giselle, Izzie, Gizzie. She then called Dad (David! David! David!), shouting his name over and over again. Isabelle didn't need to call my name. Not because of the twin telepathy thing people always talk about, but because we were holding hands. We were holding hands the tightest we have ever held hands in our entire lives. We were holding hands just as we had been holding hands on the day we were born. We had shared the same amniotic sac, and during Mom's C-section, the doctor told our parents that he would need to untwine our tiny fingers to separate us. We were born holding hands. And now, even as our heads bobbed and our bodies flopped — mine strapped behind the seatbelt and Isabelle’s loose and unprotected — we screamed for our parents who were screaming for us, but we wouldn’t let go.

Editorial Reviews

Praise for Untwine:

NAACP Image Awards Outstanding Literary Work
2015 VOYA Magazine Perfect Ten
CCBC Choices List selection
Bank Street College of Education Best Children's Books of the Year, 2016
New York Public Library Best Books for Teens selection

"I fell in love with Untwine. It's a book I want to give my daughter, my sister, my best friend. Danticat is a master." — Jacqueline Woodson, National Book Award-winning author of Brown Girl Dreaming
"A genuinely moving exploration of the pain of separation." — The New York Times Book Review

* "Danticat... shines in this young adult novel... A bit mystery, a bit romance... a touch of humor, well-crafted characters and strong writing make this a book to recommend[.]" — School Library Journal, starred review

"[T]his tale of grief and resilience should appeal to people who love Danticat's fiction for adults, too[.] Danticat takes several staples of young imaginations (and some old ones, too) — and spins something beautiful yet down to earth out of each one. While Danticat fully grounds Giselle in her identity as a Haitian-American teen in Miami, this gentle young artist could speak to any teen anywhere coping with a major loss." — The Philadelphia Inquirer
*"[A]t once heartbreaking and uplifting." — Publishers Weekly, starred review

"An honest, endearing exploration of family, grief, and perseverance." — Kirkus Reviews

From the Publisher

★ 06/08/2015
Giselle, an art lover, and Isabelle, a budding composer, are 16-year-old Haitian-American twins living in Miami. After the SUV carrying the girls and their recently separated parents is hit, Giselle’s world unravels. Danticat (Krik? Krak!) vividly represents the path from shock to healing as Giselle and her parents grapple with Isabelle’s death. When the police start questioning the circumstances of the accident, friends Jean Michel and Tina help Giselle uncover startling details about the driver, a subplot that propels the novel forward with the suggestion that Isabelle’s death was not in vain. Danticat’s gracious and poetic language haunts as Giselle moves through “star-blinding pain,” both physical and emotional, discovering the inner world of her sister and reconciling the guilt she feels at being the surviving twin. With a dynamic family of uncles, aunts, grandparents, and family friends, Giselle creates a bridge for herself, moving from twinned to “untwinned” and to a place where the best of her sister lives on in her. Danticat’s final scenes are at once heartbreaking and uplifting. Ages 12–up. Agent: Nicole Aragi, Aragi Inc. (Sept.)

Publishers Weekly

★ 07/01/2015
Gr 7 Up—Identical twins Isabelle and Giselle were born with their fingers entwined and the doctors had to separate them, digit by digit. Now at 16, their parents are separated and considering divorce and the twins are developing their own interests and friends. As the unhappy family is running late to Isabelle's school orchestra concert, the two are once again holding hands when the red minivan hits their SUV. For several days after the accident, the doctors and Aunt Leslie think Giselle is the twin who died and call her Isabelle, and Giselle, trapped in a coma, cannot tell them who she is. Unable to wake up or move, Giselle travels through her memory of friends, family, and mostly of Isabelle as she decides whether to let go of her twin and return to life or to stay in her vegetative state. Waking up, though, only leads to physical pain and grief as she struggles to recover from the accident and her sister's death. Haitian-born Danticat, better known for her adult books, shines in this young adult novel that at times seems to move into the supernatural and mystical before yanking readers back into realism. A bit mystery, a bit romance, even a touch of humor, the strong writing leads readers on a journey through Giselle's past, a journey she must take before she can face the present—and the future without Isabelle. VERDICT Well-crafted characters and strong writing make this a book to recommend, especially for fans of Gayle Forman's If I Stay (Dutton, 2009).—Janet Hilbun, University of North Texas

School Library Journal

2015-05-18
Tragedy strikes twin sisters Giselle and Isabelle, and their world is changed forever. Sixteen-year-old Giselle Boyer wakes up in a hospital room unable to speak or move. She recalls an accident while en route to Isabelle's school orchestra concert. Was the accident her fault? And where are her parents, and where is Isabelle? Alternating between periods of awareness and unconsciousness, Giselle begins to piece together what happened to her family. She also conjures memories: of Isabelle, high-spirited, artistic, and brilliant; of their childhood and unbreakable bond; of their parents' troubled marriage; and of blissful summers past spent in their family's native Haiti. As she ponders, Giselle wonders who she is and who she will be without her twin. National Book Award nominee and American Book Award winner Danticat delivers a lyrical, heart-wrenching novel for teens about love (familial and romantic), friendship, and loss that traverses multiple worlds—between life and death, between twins, and between the past and the present. In a lyrical, often wistful first-person narration, Giselle seeks to uncover the forces behind the event that altered her life and the lives of everyone she loves. Her emotional pain is raw, and Danticat presents both it and the lingering physical injuries she and her parents struggle with unflinchingly. An honest, endearing exploration of family, grief, and perseverance. (Fiction. 13-18)

Kirkus Reviews

Read More