Double Trouble

After recently finishing Andrew Clement's The Landry News, I thought I had figured out where the title of his book, Lost and Found had come from. It was the same as the title of the controversial short story featured in the challenged issue of the Landry News. The short story was about a boy having a hard time dealing with his parents' divorce. The book by the same title was not, as I had guessed, a continuation of the short story.

Instead, it was an incredibly imaginative (I hope) starting with the first day of school for Jay Gleason, twin brother of Ray Gleason. But on this first day at a new school, he is on his own (with his brother sick at home) and makes the surreal discovery that his brother's file has been lost, or rather, combined with his. For the first time in his life, he was an individual, not part of a pair. And he liked it. And he saw an opportunity. The brothers decide the risk is worth the experience of an individual identity. They realize it can't last forever, and quickly realize the complications involved in leading a double, or rather, single life. But every other day, one of the two brothers stays home from school. But they begin to realize that the real fun is...at school.

In reading the back cover jacket flap, I learned something new about a favorite author. Andrew Clements has 20 years of field observation experience of twins as the father of two of them himself. Frindle is his most well known title, but the more I read of Andrew Clements books, the more interested I become. As an author, his writing invites you in. As an educator, he helps you to question the way things are in a healthy and constructive way. And as a student, he may just give you a few ideas...and you can decide what to do with them.