I would like to thank NetGalley, Random House Children’s/Delacorte Press, and author Natasha Preston for providing me an ARC of this novel.

This novel in a nutshell is set around a pair of twins who were raised separately, but brought back together due to the death of their mother. Iris and Ivy go their separate ways, and you end up with some Parent Trap vibes. Iris gives her sister Ivy some weird feelings when they start living together, but she attributes it to the fact that her main parent just died.

This story is thrilling, dark, and makes you think. It does start out a bit slow, but speeds up the more you read. Preston does an amazing job of giving both of the twins their own unique characteristics, while also making them a cohesive set of siblings.

Once you start to realize just what Iris is doing to Ivy, you’ll be flipping through the pages at 100 miles per hour. You’ll want to know how this book ends, which makes up for the slower start. You will be left wanting more when you finish this story.

Thank you again to those listed for the ARC of this book!

The Twin is about a set of twins who were raised separately but are brought back together because of the death of their mother. Iris moves in with Ivy and their father and Ivy begins thinking Iris is trying to steal her life!
The story is dark and a bit of a thriller. I think it would be a good start for someone who is interested in getting into reading thrillers. I thought the writing was good, and I enjoyed the story there just a few things that bothered me enough to affect my overall rating of the book.
The first issue I had was pacing. I get that not all stories start right off with action but this one really felt like a slow burn for at least half of the book. Things picked up from there but the conclusion of the story ended up feeling a bit rushed to me. I wasn't very happy with the ending because of that but the story felt unresolved as well. I would actually love to see a sequel to address some of the questions I still have.
In terms of the characters it was hit or miss for me. Some of the characters felt very flushed out and realistic and some just didn't make sense to me. For example, Ivy's friends just didn't seem like they could be real people. Several times Ivy talked about how her friendships were so much more real and deep than the ones Iris had, and yet they were swayed so easily. Either her friends drastically changed or Ivy never had a good sense of her friends and neither of those options felt realistic.
Overall I would say it was a good book, just not for me. I was able to appreciated several things about it but the ending just didn't sit right with me. I would recommend this though for people interested in young adult thrillers.

Ivy and Iris are identical twins. When their parents got divorced, Ivy went with her dad and Iris went with her mom. They would both go visit the other parent, but lived with their respective parent the majority of the time. Things were going great for Ivy and living with her dad until one day, her mom had an accident and dies. Iris had to move in with Ivy and her dad. Ivy was not real sure how she felt about the new living situation. She loved her twin but she also loved having her dad to herself and being the only child.

Shortly after Iris moves in, Ivy starts noticing strange things that Iris does but she chalks it up to Iris just dealing with their mom's death in her own way. Ivy is seeing a psychologist that she thinks will help her deal with the grieving process properly. Ivy is not sure how things will go for her and Iris when Iris starts going to the same school as Ivy. Iris had been in a larger school and having to adjust to a smaller one might be a little rough for her. i thought that Natasha Preston did a very good job of making the twins have some of the same characteristics but them separating them in their own way too. To me that would be hard to write in a book. This was very well done though.

As we go on and the girls go to school together, we start to see what Iris is up to and wonder where things are going to go for the girls. Ivy gets blamed for everything when in actuality she doesn't do anything. I started to feel sorry for Ivy after a little while. She could not catch a break. She had to give up things that she loved just because of things that Iris had done to get her in trouble. Iris was a little you know what!

You will not want to put this book down once you get into what Iris is doing to Ivy. You will want to know how things end for Ivy just like I did. This was such a good read with twist her and there for sure. I didn't see the ending coming and was surprised at it for sure. You won't be disappointed for sure with this one.

I voluntarily read and reviewed this book and all opinions are my own. Thanks to Netgalley, the publisher and the author for an advanced copy of this book!

Psychologically thrilling. Twins, Ivy and Iris, have been living separate lives since their parents divorce six years ago. Iris lives with their mother and Ivy with their father. They see each other on vacations and weekends, until their mother’s unexpected death. Not close, even as siblings, they have to figure out how to make this work again. Then Ivy starts getting into trouble and bad things start happening. What is going on? Who is behind all this? Thrilling, on the edge of your seat read that will leave you wanting more.

Thank you NetGalley, Natasha Preston and Delacorte Press for this edition and hearing my honest review. Looking forward to reading more with you
#partner

I was immediately drawn in by the blurb. Since their parents divorce, twins Ivy and Iris have lived apart. But when their mother dies, Iris moves in with Ivy and their Dad. Almost immediately Iris’s seemingly perfect life is turned upside down. I really enjoyed THE TWIN and I am looking forward to exploring the works of Ms. Preston. That ending though.... I’m ok when things aren’t tied up nicely in a bow but damn!

The concept of this book was alright but it stopped at The concept. It
had an interesting plot, but it just dragged along. This book was easy to
read on the sense of reading (how Ryder writes) but not as far as
keeping my interest. I didn't think the characters were realistic and it
distracted me from the story. The ending was not very good either, it was
unsatisfying.
Thank you so much NetGalley Bookouture for providing me with this
book!!

An exciting thriller about twin sisters, one good, one evil. After a tragic accident leaves them motherless, chaos ensues, This one will keep you guessing until the very end. And at the end, you’ll still be guessing! I devoured this in one sitting!!

Welcome Back!


I did so well for a while there! I kept to my schedule and had been reading like a machine, then I lost my pace and things went off track pretty fast. But the good news is I am back and hoping to be back on schedule! I have things planned out for the rest of April (and April just started, so this is a great sign), hopefully, I can take it from there and get May planned out as well. One of the books I finished recently was my Netgalley ARC of the Twin (which just came out March 3rd, so if you are interested you can now pick up a copy)! I chose this one out of my TBR pile because I was looking for some mystery thriller and I did not want to pick up Hand on the Wall just yet (yes, I have been dying to read it but I also do not want it to end).


SPOILERS AHEAD


In this book, we follow Ivy and Iris who are now both living with their father after their mother's sudden recent death. Before this the twins were living pretty separate lives, Ivy was living with their dad and Iris with their mom. One twin living in the city the other living in the country. They still saw each other and the other parent on holidays but this was going to be a big adjustment. Once Iris moves in she starts to copy Ivy, which at first is a little weird but the more she copies her the weirder it gets. It starts with little things like insisting they have the same class schedule at school and quickly goes to the same hairstyle and joining the same sports teams. Ivy starts to speak up and tries to tell people around her that things are not okay but no one believes her. Everyone just believes that Iris is going through a big adjustment losing her home and her mother all at once but Ivy thinks there is more to it and when she finds someone else who can prove she is right she has to figure out how to show everyone else before it's too late and Iris completely takes over her life.


The premise of this book sounded super interesting and like I said I wanted a mystery or thriller. However, if I am honest I called what was going to happen in this book from like the first five percent (I was reading on Kindle), now for me this is a big deal. I am not someone who can usually call what is going to happen in mystery/thriller books ahead of time. But not only did I call it but I was 100% correct about what was going to happen, by the time I finished reading the book I found I was more annoyed with the ending (not going to say what happened because I do not want to spoil it but I do not feel like I got the satisfactory ending I was hoping for and felt like we were working for). I am going to give this book two stars on Goodreads.





***Thank you to the publisher for the netgalley ARC!

DNF at 20%

There was nothing thriller-esque about this book because it was so painfully dull. Honestly, nothing Iris does is that unusual.

She doesn't want to talk about her mother's death. GASP! What's wrong with her?! Maybe...that everyone deals with grief in different ways? And she might not be ready to talk about it?

She doesn't want to go to therapy. GASP! She's evil! ...No, maybe she's just not ready for therapy, or she doesn't need it. Not everyone who goes through trauma needs therapy.

She wants to hang out with Ivy's friends. GASP! ...She's at a new school and wants to make friends?

And all hell breaks loose when she requests that her schedule match Ivy's exactly at school. GASP! Heaven forbid that she have someone guide her around a new school.

I know where this book is going - Iris is the evil twin who will try to take over Ivy's life. But it's not very well-written and the characters are dull so far. I'm going to call this one quits.

*Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review.*

This was the first book for me by this author I found it intriguing from the first page the twins losing their mother now we'll have to live together with the father and
Iris always wants to do everything her twin sister does same classrooms seems to be on the same level as her sister once everything her sister has so it seems she's quite different.. when she first came to live with her father and her twin after their mother died on a run one early morning because their mother kept firm and fit believed in staying that way.
Ivy living with her mom things were always easy going. she could do pretty much whatever but living with , dad and her twin things will be different this was a good book I enjoyed it.... thank you netgally..
The things you learn about twins who haven't been living in the same house for 6 years.

‘Ivy finds out that her twin sister, Iris, is trying to push her out of her own life—and might be responsible for their mother’s death.’

THE TWIN, a YA Psychological Thriller, is the first book that I have read by Natasha Preston and will most definitely not be my last. To say the conclusion surprised me would be an understatement, I wasn’t expecting the book to end on that note, and I am, however, praying for a sequel!

Thank you, NetGalley and Delacorte Press, for loaning me an eBook of THE TWIN in exchange for an honest review.

Highly Recommend!

Thank you Netgalley for this ARC.

Unfortunately, I decided at 50% not to finish this book. That's not common for me, but I was really struggling to
get through it. In a few sentences, the basic plot is that Ivy's mother died, and therefore her twin sister Iris has moved back in with her and her father. There's supposed to be some twin creepiness that leads to Ivy suspecting that Iris may possibly have played some part in their mother's death and may be trying to hurt her as well.

My main problem was, 50% into the story, there still is no twin creepiness. Iris has kind of shoved her way into Ivy's life, but to me it honestly seemed more annoying than malignant. And Ivy is super annoying too; the whole book (or for the half I read) she's constantly questioning Iris. What is she doing? Why is she doing that? Who is she talking to? And then she second guesses herself and tells herself that she's being overbearing, that Iris is dealing with things in her own way, etc. It's over and over and over in the story! Honestly, just decide. Either you're suspicious and you have a good reason to be, or you decide you're being paranoid and get over it. You can't keep floating between the two.

Ivy also has no confrontational skills AT ALL. She thinks her friends are mad at her, but she doesn't want to ask them what's going on. She talks over and over again about how her dad and her have a close relationship, and then she's afraid he won't believe her if she tries to be honest with him. I honestly feel like the problem in the story could easily have been Ivy and not Iris at all.

Again, I hate to DNF an ARC. It's entirely possible that I'm being too critical, but I just couldn't move past these things. I needed more action, WAY more creepiness (like the blurb for the book suggests), and less annoying characters.

I was super excited to get approved for this eARC! But after finishing the book and reflecting on it, it was not what I expected. I was expecting so much more suspense and definitely not the ending I was thinking it would be. Overall it was a decent story, it had its slow moments, but was decent overall. I will definitely read more from Natasha Preston, but will not be coming back to this title.

❝ Nothing is okay right now, and I'm scared it never will be again. ❞

I was really looking forward to reading this one! When I found out about The Twin I thought it would be something I really enjoyed because I've been so into mystery/thrillers lately and I love the good twin/bad twin trope, but I ended up being underwhelmed by the plot.

Ivy and Iris are twins who couldn't be any more different. They've grown up apart since their parents divorced years ago, but when their mother passes away, Ivy's life is forever changed.

The relationship between Ivy and Iris was incredibly well written it was definitely one of my favorite parts of the book. The way it developed from the beginning from them being strangers to the uneasy tension really kept me waiting for the next wave of drama. I was glued to every page. It helped me to really connect with Ivy and feel her unease and frustration at all the things going on, but it was like there was all this energy built up that went nowhere.

The biggest issue for me in this book was the plot. Natasha Preston did a great job of building the tension between Ivy and Iris like I said, but nothing ever seemed to go Ivy's way so it got really frustrating (and boring). Having the antagonist always win is equally as boring as having nothing bad ever happen to the main character. It just made everything too predictable.

❝ The more time I spend with my sister, the less I think I know her. She has secrets. ❞

By about halfway through the book I had already guessed the ending. I felt frustrated that not a single person was on Ivy's side despite her having everything going for her to be a credible character (followed rules, good grades, ambitious, dedicated). It added to my frustration that nothing was happening and Iris went unchallenged.

I think having one person on Ivy’s side would've made for a much more interesting story. I was actually hoping that Logan would be that person and then maybe he and Ivy would've had an actual romantic relationship develop while they investigated. It would've added some obstacles for Iris and would’ve made for some great drama overall.

The other issues with the story were Ivy's character being passive and the slow pacing. Ivy was passive and just reacting to Iris' actions for about 80% of this book. She didn't really fight back against the things Iris did and she didn't start looking into the mystery behind Iris’ friends and their mother’s death until the book was almost over. It really made the plot feel slow and I found it hard to really love the book.

There was definitely a great story here. The relationships were there, the chance for a great plot, chance for all this romance and drama, but ultimately it felt like the potential for a great book was wasted. I wasn’t satisfied with the ending--it just felt too easy and predictable. In the end, I think the predictable and straightforward plot was what sealed in my two-star rating for this one.

While I enjoyed parts of this book and it can be entertaining enough for a quick read, I can't say that it's likely to blow you away.

The Twin by Natasha Preston

I absolutely love every book I’ve ever read by this author! She has a way to draw you in and keep you hanging on every word! The twin was such a wonderfully written story I can’t wait to find out what happens next!!

5 stars

The Twin, by Natasha Preston, is a delicious, twisty YA novel. Separated by their parent's divorce, Ivy and Iris chose to live with a different parent. Staying with their dad, Ivy focuses on becoming a champion swimmer and enjoys a small circle of close friends as well as her first serious boyfriend, Ty. Popular, cool, laidback Iris lives with their mom in the city. The twins see each other on weekends and school breaks but as they grow up and their lives become less-entwined they are not even close like a lot of sisters, let alone twins. Tragedy strikes when their mom dies and Iris has to move in with Ivy and their dad.

Determined to help her sister fit in, Ivy agrees to help Iris and introduce her to her friends and boyfriend. But underneath the surface, danger is lurking. Ivy's friends start to turn away from her and their dad stops trusting her. Things are not adding up and soon Ivy questions if their mom's death was an accident.

A cat and mouse game ensues with a shocking result. Pick up The Twin to find out!

I really enjoyed this YA book. The characters are well-developed, it's age appropriate and twisty enough to keep you on the edge of your seat.

Thank you to NetGalley, the writer and publisher for this ARC in exchange for my honest feedback.

I was so excited to read this one, even while reading it I was excited to find what happens next! But then I looked and there were only 10 pages left. It felt like the ending was so rushed. There could have been soooo much more story to this one. Up until it ended abruptly I did really enjoy it! Thanks @netgalley for this ARC!

Thank you for an advanced copy. I ended up purchasing this book and have found I am enjoying Natasha Preston's writing.

I am loving all of Natasha Prestons book and this did Not disappoint! .. They are YA books but i always like that genre.

3/5 Stars

Twins Iris and Ivy have lost their mother to a tragic running accident. Now life has drastically changed for the both of them. Ivy lived with their father. Iris lived with their mother. Now Iris is joining her father and her semi-estranged sister and starting a new life at a new school. The only problem is, her new life is starting to look a lot like the life Ivy already had, or at least the life she had before Iris showed up and started turning everyone against her. What on earth is Iris up to?

Reviews on this book seem to be either overwhelmingly positive or overwhelmingly negative. I can definitely see both sides of these arguments.

Cons:
- The writing leaves a lot to be desired. Sometimes this book reads like something a middle school student might have written. The dialogue isn't exactly realistic and the descriptions can be simplistic. The teenagers don't always sound like teenagers.
- The chapters all tend to end the same way - with ridiculous questions. Nothing is subtle here. Nearly every chapter ends with "But why did Iris have to hang out with my friends?" or a simple "Why?".
- Ivy is a flat character. And so is everyone else.
- Everyone is stupid. Literally everyone. Ivy is supposed to be this smart, over-achieving, straight-A student, but she takes forever to put things together. Her friends are even worse. They are not great people or even good friends. Her boyfriend is over-dramatic and not interesting. Ivy and Iris's father doesn't see anything that's plainly apparent. Also, the parents apparently NEVER communicated about their children or this whole book wouldn't have happened.

Pros:
- I haven't seen another YA book with an ending like this, so students will definitely find that interesting and excitable.
- I enjoyed reading the last half of the book once I got used to the writing and accepted that the characters were complete stereotypes.
- I enjoyed only having one narrator. The trend in YA novels is to alternate POV chapters and it's refreshing to just have one head to be inside and understand.


Overall, I didn't find the book to be horrible and I didn't find it to be amazing. It was "meh" for me, but since I liked reading the last half of it, I've upped my review to three stars.

** For parents and teachers, this book is decently clean. There is a little bit of heavy kissing, but nothing beyond that. There are a few curse words, but with what Ivy goes through, it's to be expected. For a thriller, it's pretty clean.**

** Special thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for an eARC of this book. in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own. **