photo from identicalstrangersbook.com
Identical Strangers: A Memoir of Twins Separated and Reunited
A few times while I was reading Identical Strangers, I tried googling a review of the book (with no luck in finding one), because I kept wondering if other people felt the same way as me. The story of how Elyse Schein and Paula Bernstein were separated as infants and reunited as adults is fascinating. They are a living example of how nature and nurture interact (and according to their experience, nature usually wins.)
However, the writing of this memoir (shared between the two sisters) was consistently melodramatic, and, at times, completely off-putting. I strongly considered not finishing the book several times because I was so annoyed with the twins’ constant complaints that they had not been raised together, that they had not been told by their adoption agency that they were twins, that they had unknowingly been a part of a twin study arranged by the adoption agency, etc.
Near the end of the book, when the women finally meet the scientist who conducted research on twins who had been purposely separated for study, I found myself siding with Dr. Neubauer, not the twins, because I was so fed up with their whining. Both women dealt with undeniable hardship in their lives, but unfortunately they used this novel as an opportunity to bask in cliché-ridden self-pity, instead of focusing all of their energy on how the interesting topic of nature vs. nurture played a significant role in their lives.
I wouldn’t say the book was a total loss, because it did help me form a more educated opinion on the matter of nature vs. nature, but I would say that if you want to read Identical Strangers for yourself, don’t buy the book, borrow it, because it isn’t something you’re going to want to read twice.
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