Four girls live on a tropical island where they attend school and are cared for by a man and a woman who are not their parents. The man and woman have told them that their parents died in a fiery plane crash and they are orphans. The four girls believe this to be true. The four girls each have a different name and a different hair color, but in thought and word they are almost identical. The four girls are happy, or at least believe they are. And then a fifth girl washes up on their shore. Her ship went down and she was the only survivor. She is different. Her skin is different, her hair is different, her voice is different. She also is different in that she believes nothing the man and woman tell her. She thinks for herself, and her thoughts are identical to no one’s. The four girls are confused. The four girls are intrigued.The four girls start questioning each other. The four girls start to question everything. And then everything changes. This mind-bending science fiction hurt my head in the best possible way. It is a fascinating puzzle of a book where you only know as much as Veronika, the red-headed girl. Her narrative voice is oddly formal and her cadence is strange. You have to read her words more than once and even then they don’t always make sense. But hidden in them are small clues that let you know these four girls are not what they seem. Clues like, “We never used Irene’s clips, because we needed our hair like it was, hanging down and wiped clean to catch the sun.†As I gathered the clues, I began to see that I was on an entirely different island than the one I had started with. And it was AWESOME. I was shocked. I was surprised. I was impressed. I knew immediately I was going to have to go back and read it again. I also knew it was going to be one of the most talked about books of the year. And so will you, when it comes to a library, bookstore or e-reader near you.
