Dear Great Book Guru,   My childhood friends Julia and Claire  are celebrating their birthday in the next few days so I think a book  about twins might be great fun to read and discuss when we get together to celebrate. Any thoughts? Toasting with Twins

Dear Toasting with Twins,  I recently read  Daniel Sada’s ONE OUT OF TWO, a very short, very funny, very thought-provoking book about the Gamal sisters.  Set in mid twentieth century rural Mexico, the novel introduces us to Constitucion and Gloria, identical twins who share a home, a business, and eventually a fiancé.  In a storyline reminiscent of Charles Dickens, the girls are orphaned at a young age and left in the care of a distant relative who withholds their inheritance for many years.  When they are finally able to claim this money, the sisters create a very rich, very satisfying life for themselves – one out of two… until Oscar Segura arrives.   We are party to the sisters’ sometimes comic, sometimes dramatic interludes with him as a colorful bevy of friends and neighbors look on. We see their lives come together and then pull apart and then come together again.  It is this raveling and unraveling of their union that makes Sada’s novella such a fascinating read.  Recommended!


HUBRIS- another good book I read this week that some of you might be interested in reading....