Twice Told

Twice Told
written by various



Twice Told is an astoundingly original concept and a great book. The stories are based on pictures, and two authors worked on each piece of art to produce two separate, very different stories. They are "twice told" through both the writing and the art, and "twice told" between the two authors. Different authors definitely had different takes on the project. Some, to my annoyance, focused very much on the image itself, taking time to actually describe what is already depicted. Others jumped right in, making for more interesting, active stories. Description in many of the stories seemed very redundant, since the picture was right there, but many of the authors felt it necessary anyways. Going a little more into specific authors and their stories, I think my least favorite was Audrey Coulombis's piece. The most shocking aspect of the book, I'd really have to say, was the John Green story without a *gasp* ROAD TRIP. What has happened to this world? Margaret Peterson Haddix's story was good, but unlike anything else I've ever read from her. I felt like many of the authors tried too hard, as often, to make their stories "quirky", and the stories then turned out anything but. As is usual with short stories, I found myself really enjoying stories by random authors, and not particularly liking the ones written by authors I was previously familiar with. The biggest shocker had to be Nancy Werlin's extremely powerful story, Rebecca. It definitely grabbed my heart and was by far my favorite of the collection.

Rating: 3.5/5