Reading Response for "IDENTICAL"

     I am currenly reading the book Identical by Ellen Hopkins. I would tell you what it's about, but I can hardly decipher that myself. This has been one of the most intriguing writing forms I've ever come across as a reader. The book Identical is not only written as an anthology of poems that make up one story, but its also told from two perspectives. I'm utterly perplexed by this book becuase it constantly goes in and out of the two different view points of these two completley different identical twins. Kaeleigh and Raeanne.
      Each chapter repeats it's self (these chapters are very brief), in the two different perspectives of the twin sisters. The poems are set up with putting key words that describe or sum up the main idea on the left side of the page, while the actual story is on the right side of the page (I thought this was significant because in English we read left to right, so it's almost like the main idea's hit us first, and then the details emerge later to fill in those empty spots ). In all the chapters that are "Identical" to each other, the key words are all the same while the actual story is told differently between the two different view points of the twins. This may sound irritating to read the same thing more than once, but I admire it because I think author is really putting significance into each word that goes into the book by repeating it twice. And the different and disturbing emotions and messages of these characters really sink into you.
     (Kaeleigh is the good one. The good girl with an awfull past, both twins take after one parent. Kaleigh takes after Dad. The father, while Raeanne takes after their mother. I really admirer Ellen Hopkin's way of contrasting these two twins using their parents. *SPOILER* The father in this story is very ill in his mind (obviously) because he molested Kaeleigh when she was young. With such a trauma as a child this has caused Kaeleigh to be disturbed as well. Instead of facing fears in an inappropriate sexual way like her father, Kaeleigh finds herself doing gory things like hurting herself to let out the anger and confusion she holds. And, her and "Daddy" both hide the same secret. Raeanne on the other hand always knew about what happened to her sister, but she's always avoiding the truth. She just wants to have a good time and rarely thinks of others just like her mother who became a politician just to escape the family she dreaded and didn't want to deal with. 
       I feel like this story has a powerful element of denial in it. In school, through out many grades I was always taught about the elements of a story and how it should have the quest, or a goal that the main characters are trying to achieve. In this anthology of poems I feel that there is no outer quest, but instead an inner quest the sisters share which is to avoid the issues in their home life. They are two different people that deal with things in different ways, but they both are secretive and fake. In public, like at school ex... it's like nothings wrong with them, and their peppy, happy and pretty California girls. This whole book is written in an anthology of poems webbed together that express the feelings of the boiling, hidden emotions that are bottled up but just ready to explode. As the story moves on, the outer shells of the two main characters start to crack.