Ken Follett: The Third Twin

Ken Follett

The Third Twin

Monika says:

Since Dolly the Sheep hit the news cloning has been a matter of public interest that caused a big stir and inspires a number of novelists to pick up the pen or rather: the computer keyboard. One of them is Ken Follett, known for books like THE NEEDLE or THE PILARS OF THE EARTH.

The story of THE THIRD TWIN takes place at a major American university. Scientist Jeannie Ferrami conducts a study on identical twins who grew up seperately. Especially when one of the pair is a criminal and the other is not. She wants to find out if criminality is genetic and therefore hereditary. One of her test subjects is suspected of having raped Jeannie's best friend on the university premises and to have started a fire in the campus gym. Jeannie knows the young man's psychological profile and can't believe he did either. She sets out on her own to find out what really happened. Her investigation leads her to believe that there must be a third twin who committed the crimes.

THE THIRD TWIN is a strange and not always successful mixture of science fiction and mystery. It is not quite believable that 20 years ago human beings were successfully cloned even if it was supposedly a top secret military project. Research about twins hold a certain fascination for many people. Especially the question whether identical twins absolutely have to develope identical patterns of behavior or an identical character. There are certainly interesting aspects touched by the story.

However, the question comes up whether this was intended to be a movie script right from the start. It seems very obvious to me. The story is just too simplistic and straightforward. It has since been made into a movie, but not for the big screen.

The book is an interesting read in between because it's packed with suspense and easy to read. The story may be a bit predictable, but provides for enough suspense to keep on going. But don't expect too much. There are no deep insights into the dangers of genetic technology. It's an average mystery, maybe even slightly above the average.

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Monika Hübner