The Silent Twins

Two sisters, one private language and a bond no one else could enter.

When identical twins June and Jennifer Gibbons were three, they began rejecting communication with almost everyone except each other. Their extraordinary bond drew them into a private world that became increasingly difficult for anyone outside it to enter.

As the twins grew older, Their isolation deepened, their creative lives expanded and, after a five-week spree of vandalism and arson, both were sentenced to detention in Broadmoor.

Investigative journalist Marjorie Wallace entered their world and reconstructed their story, following the forces that shaped their childhood, alienation, institutionalisation and fierce dependence on one another. The result is an intimate account of a relationship that resisted easy explanation, and of the consequences when two young women at the margins of society became bound almost entirely to each other.

‘A compelling and tragic story’ Mail on Sunday

‘Breathtaking’ Independent

‘Extraordinary’ Oliver Sacks, New York Times Review of Books