Review: The Originals - Cat Patrick

I glance at the three baby portraits in thick wooden frames.
I feel a familiar prickling on the back of my neck.
Because I know there's another picture somewhere- and the baby in that photo looks identical to the babies on the wall.
Somewhere, there's a photo of the Original.

Ella, Betsey and I look like sisters: triplets, you might think.

But that's not all.

We are clones in hiding. We split our lives and exist as one person in the outside world. And we've always been happy.

But now I've fallen head-over-heels in love . . . and that changes everything.

Because, to let love in, I need to be allowed to be Me.

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Review:
Lizzie, Ella and Betsey may look like triplets but in fact the three of them are all clones created illegally by scientists in a genetics research lab. Their mother was the egg donor and gave birth to them but their DNA was all copied from another child. When she found out that two of her babies would be destroyed their mother ran and the family have been in hiding ever since. Worried that they will be discovered she has become obsessed with protecting the girls and she insists that they pretend to be only one person. Each girl gets a different part of the day when they are allowed to leave the house, Ella gets mornings, Lizzie gets afternoons and Betsey gets evenings. At all other times they must remain in their isolated house being home-schooled in the lessons that only one of them gets to actually attend. They must juggle friendships, act the same, dress the same and never, ever be seen in public together.

Cat Patrick always comes up with such unusual stories and I wanted to read The Originals from the minute I read the synopsis. I have no clue where she gets her ideas from but her books always make you think and that is one of the things I love about them. It was really interesting to see how different each of the clones was to each other. Although they are physically identical their personalities are very different, they all have different strengths and weaknesses and they don't agree on anything. In a lot of ways they are like any other sisters, they have their arguments and disagreements but they always have each others backs. Unfortunately because they have to pretend to be one person they have more clashes than most, it can be difficult for them to even agree on their outfits for the day or what to do with their hair. I felt so bad for them the way their mother controlled everything about their lives and the more you learn about her behaviour the more worrying it became.

I can't really talk too much more about the plot for fear of spoilers but I will say I loved the way Sean handled things when he found out what was going on. The relationship between him and Lizzie developed a little too quickly for my taste but he was such a sweet guy and he was so determined to look out for Lizzie and her sisters that you have to like him. The majority of the plot revolves around how difficult it is to have three very different girls pretending to be one person. I had expected more danger, especially when you realise that the mother stole the girls from the lab, but I enjoyed Lizzie's voice and getting to know the girls. The stakes are raised when Lizzie meets Sean and becomes determined to find a way to date him. She starts to realise that her mum is keeping secrets and the girls have to work together to find out what is really going on. There were some interesting twists from that point onwards, a couple that I'd made pretty good guesses at but others that took me completely by surprise. The Originals is a great story, one that raised questions I'm still thinking about days after I finished reading it. I already had Cat Patrick on my auto-buy list and I can't wait to see what crazy idea she comes up with next!

Source: Received from Egmont in exchange for an honest review

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