Doubles

by Nora Gold

Doubles takes place in 1968 in an institution for troubled youth, and is told from the perspective of a brilliant, spunky, 12-year-old girl who is obsessed with math. Engagingly written and often funny, this novella explores how a sensitive young teenager changes over a six-month period from a polite, quiet “good girl” into a delinquent. Although set in the past, Doubles has direct relevance to today, with our recently heightened awareness of the harsh reality in some of our residential institutions during that era (including for Indigenous children, but not only).

Genres: Historical Fiction, Novella, Young Adult, Fiction, Literary Fiction

86 pages, Paperback

Published May 1, 2026

Reviews

[Shelley's Book Nook · Rating 4 out of 5]

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⭐⭐⭐⭐
Doubles
Nora Gold
Publication Date: May 1st 2026
Literary Press Group of Canada | Guernica Editions
86 Pages
Amazon | Bookshop.org
Genre: General Fiction | Novellas & Short Stories | Women's Fiction

I don’t have any power; I’m just a kid. Well okay, a teenager now. Still, the grownups have all the power here. They’re Moscow and I’m little Prague.

This is a short book (novella), but it's very hard-hitting. I was only two years old in 1968 when this story takes place, but I really felt a kinship with 12-year-old girl. Like me, she excels in math, and that was more common in boys than girls back in the day. Her mother has passed away, and her father is having a breakdown, so she is shipped from the family farm to a home (really not homey at all, though) for troubled youngsters.

She is reassured this is for her protection, not as a punishment, but she quickly realizes that not being a troublemaker makes her ripe for being picked on. This story just goes to show how a vulnerable young lady was failed by the system meant to protect her.

I liked the way a lot of the story was told through journal entries. It made the book feel more personal, and her wit and charm shine through. She uses numbers to calm her chaotic life; it makes her world seem less confusing. Over the six months we spend with her, she starts as a good-natured girl and turns into a juvenile delinquent.

Her loss of innocence shows how being locked up changes her. Even though it is set in 1968 (Beatles references!), it still holds true today—these institutions are failing our youth. But the best part is that these very heavy themes don't distract from her resilience. She has suffered so much loss: her parent, her home, and her innocence. This was a wonderful story that was very character-driven with lots of emotional depth and intelligence, even though our main character is only 12 years old... and you can't help but root for her. I often asked myself, did she always have this in her, or did where she was make her that way? love books about the human condition, and it was a wonder to meet her. It’s always a pleasure when a book can bridge the gap between decades and make a fictional character’s troubles feel so up close and personal.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

[Liralen · Rating 4 out of 5]

1968: A girl is sentenced to stay in an institution for troubled youth for reasons she only sort of understands. She's twelve, and what she does understand is that numbers make sense in a way that people don't. She understands that home might not be a safe place, but this institution is not much better. She understands, eventually, that it might be a long time before she gets out. And she understands that this might be the thing that breaks her.

My I is fading so fast that it might not be here tomorrow. Soon all that will be left of me is the She that the counselors observe. (loc. 672*)

This is a tight, short, intense book. It's designed to make your heart quietly break for this girl, who has—through no fault of her own—virtually no options left. A math book in the institution library gives her some hope, but...there's not much else that does. There's the occasional adult who is kind, but many of them are overtly out for their own interests or just don't care; like our narrator, they too have perhaps gotten more jaded over time.

We see the events of this story through our narrator's lens as a child, not as someone looking back, so the change is gradual and subtle—a girl changing from someone innocent, someone with hope, to someone hardened and more desperate.

Though this takes place in 1968, much of it feels relevant for today, too—nothing I've read suggests that institutions are happier places for children now than they were then, and although there are different options in place for children for whom home is not safe, well...nothing I've read suggests that those options are great either.

Highly recommend; this is tightly written and quietly devastating.

*Quotes are from an ARC and may not be final.

Thanks to the author and publisher for providing a review copy through NetGalley.

[Tini · Rating 5 out of 5]

A small book that is more than just the sum of its parts.

Doubles by Nora Gold may be a novella, but it packs more emotional weight into its pages than many novels three times its length.

Set in 1968, the story is told entirely through the notebook entries of a nameless twelve-year-old girl living at Valleyview Children's Farm, an institution for troubled youth. What begins as a writing exercise gradually becomes something else: a private record of her thoughts, observations, fears, and hopes over the course of six months.

I absolutely adored this narrator. Brilliant, funny, observant, and obsessed with mathematics, she possesses the kind of bright, plucky spirit that immediately draws you in. Yet beneath her intelligence and humor lies a naiveté that is heartbreaking to witness as she struggles to understand the systems and adults that hold power over her life.

One of the novel's most effective choices is that we never learn her name. The omission feels doubly clever. On one hand, it underscores how thoroughly she is lost in the system and has been reduced to just another child within an institution. On the other, it makes her feel universal: she could be anyone, and therefore everyone.

Gold strikes an impressive balance between darkness and humor throughout. The subject matter is often difficult, but the narrator's voice remains so vivid and engaging that the book never becomes overwhelming. Instead, the contrast makes many of its most devastating moments land even harder.

It's hard to forget that this is technically a historical novel, as it still feels strikingly relevant today. Its exploration of institutional power, childhood vulnerability, and the ways society fails its most vulnerable children resonates far beyond its setting.

Profoundly moving, beautifully written, and greater than the sum of its pages, Doubles is a remarkable novella with an unforgettable heroine at its center. It is a story about a girl reduced to a number by the system around her, yet one that proves how immeasurable a single life can be. I wouldn't have wanted to miss it for the world.

Many thanks to Literary Press Group of Canada | Guernica Editions for providing me with an ARC via NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.

"Doubles" was published on May 1, 2026, and is available now.

[Lee · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 or 4.75 rounded up

For such a short story, this one packs a punch. It wasn't a shocking, twisty, gasp-out-loud sort of unsettling feeling that washed over me as I read, but more so a sink-into your skin feeling. It was like an insect burrowing, leaving you feeling itchy as it travels through you slowly.

Following the young narrator through written answers to prompts and then through her own diary/journal entries was engaging, and I thought it did a great job of allowing information about her character, situation, family, and experiences be 'told' and 'shown' in a good balance, seeming natural through how she is writing/responding because of the execution. I did find myself doing a double-take at times because some of the jumps in her focus while writing made me forget 'where'/'when' she was at a given time while writing, but that was probably just me as a reader (it's normal in journaling to jump around in your thoughts, time, and memories, I just struggled personally while reading it as a story).

In addition to the excellent structure and writing itself (I often struggle with children's POVs, but didn't with this one!), the story itself was resonating. It's a subtle slow-burn that delivers on its promises of peeking into residential institutions. My heart ached for the narrator as her mental health continued to devolve; going from having so much hope and optimism for her future, for 'escape' and 'rescue,' even just for excitement over learning and math, to being numb, continuously let-down, and dejected was heartbreaking.

The way her and the other children are treated by the counselors at the institution sparked a little flame in me - this might be because I could relate a bit. While definitely not the same situation (her reasons for being in the institution being related to her family), I've spent time in an inpatient setting for mental health, an IOP program, and a residential home in the past. I was 'only' in each for about one month and was incredibly affected by the treatment and experience[s] of being there. I cannot imagine enduring it for 6 months, as our narrator does in this story. Yet, having had these experiences, I think the story does a great job with reflecting the reality - not only the treatment of children at the hands of counselors, but also the mental effects of being there. Just as the narrator experiences, you lose yourself, lose hope, lose sight of feeling loved, lose trust, lose excitement and enjoyment for literally anything. The narrator sees the 'truth' of some of the other children there, too, that the counselors don't (or won't) see/acknowledge. Again, this is the reality. That is why this one sticks with me so heavily. I could see myself in it.

The ending of the story sat with me and made me feel both a sense of vengeance on behalf of the narrator and other children, as well as a bleak feeling of unease. It was the unease of their situation, their experiences, and their slow decline of who they were. Because of the institution, they become shells of who they once were.

I think the narrator's intentional lack of a name is poignant. I saw it as a reflection of her experience being applicable to 'any' child in a similar situation; it allows readers to see themselves as her. More than that, I think it reflects how she loses herself. Again, she becomes a different person, in a sense. She's a shell of who she was, nameless and 'just another one' in the counselors' eyes.

I think this is an impactful story, and I'd definitely recommend it!

*Thanks to NetGalley and Literary Press Group of Canada for the early copy to read and review.

[Rosh (on a medical break) · Rating 4 out of 5]

In a Nutshell: A literary fiction novella about a young math-obsessed girl caught in an institution. Creative in concept, clever in execution. Dark and disturbing content. A few inclusions made me uncomfortable, though these might not affect all readers. Definitely recommended. Not for children despite the young protagonist.

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Plot Preview:

1968. A twelve-year-old girl is angry at being kept in a state-run children’s home. Every day, she waits for someone to come and take her back home. But why is she there? Why is she angry?
The story is told to us in the unnamed narrator’s first-person point-of-view over a period of six months.

I had encountered Nora Gold’s writing through the brilliant flip-book with two literary novellas, “In Sickness and In Health / Yom Kippur in a Gym”. I was impressed enough to know that I would read more of her works. This second encounter of her writing has mostly justified my faith in her.

The plot is quite impressive in an understated way. It begins somewhat light, but as we continue reading, we realise just how dark it is. Listening to a child’s narration on some truly disturbing events is an unsettling experience. At the same time, I can't help praise its imaginative plot development; the structure is really creative.

Spread over six months, the content is actually a part of an exercise conducted by one of the trustees, where the child needs to write her answers to the question posed, one per week. Of course, given the loquacious nature of our lead and her flittery mind, the answers are almost stream-of-consciousness in their approach, with the response going here, there, and everywhere. Keeping track of the question asked is tricky at times, but the narrator always remembers it even when we might not.

A literary fiction work is nothing without a compelling cast of characters. Our protagonist, the unnamed twelve-year-old narrator, is possibly neurodivergent. However, as we get the story in her own first-person POV, and as it is set in 1968 – long before such issues were acknowledged, we don’t know what condition she actually has (assuming she has one.) Heck, we don’t even get to know her name, which is so sad. Staying anonymous further highlights her plight of being yet another unknown caught in the system.

One thing that is very clear about the narrator is her passion for mathematics, even though she claims that she isn't very good at it. All her thoughts involve numbers in some way or the other. These numerical insights can become fascinating or tedious, depending on how much you like maths. I enjoyed her quantitative aptitude as well as her word play. However, she also has preternatural knowledge of some more subjects such as geography, which feels a bit too much at times.

In this novella, we get to see only the main character in detail, but there are several others who walk in and out of her life. Through her frank narration, we see her opinion on those who interact with her in any way, be it her fellow inmates or any of the counsellors or her family members through her flashback memories. These little insights might be sparing, but they tell us enough, often more than our narrator even understands.

This is one thing that struck me the most about the book: there is so much said, but so much more unsaid. Though a fast-paced novella, we need to invest time in reading between the lines so as to get the holistic picture. The writing is very clever in this regard.

Another thing that impressed me was the transition in the thinking and behaviour of our narrator over the course of six months. Despite getting only a first-person version of her own story, we can clearly see the impact of her situation on her personality. Brilliantly done!

Just because the first-person comes from a child narrator, don’t assume that this is a child-friendly book. Some inclusions made me really uncomfortable, not just because of what was happening but because I was hearing such words and observations from a child. I feel quite conflicted about this aspect of the book. Though her naïveté also shows in several scenes, it is quite possible that the narrator’s neurodivergence and her extensive reading ensured a greater adult influence over her thoughts and words. It is also possible that the 1960s counterculture had influence on the thinking of even teens. But my eyes and ears couldn’t handle crude words coming from a child’s thoughts. This might not bother all readers.

The historical feel is quite subtle, though we do hear references to some events from the time period. This can be attributed to the closeted conditions of the narrator.

The ending is the icing on the cake. It is just perfect for the story, leaving us with something instead of everything, but still better than nothing.

Overall, this indie novella would be an excellent option for readers who enjoy character-oriented fiction, preferably those open to some crude content and not affected by triggers related to kids. Had the content not gone so “adult’, I might have liked this even better. But even as is, it is a compelling story that stays in the head long after the last page.

Recommended to literary fiction readers.

4 stars.


My thanks to Literary Press Group of Canada and Guernica Editions for providing the DRC of “Doubles” via NetGalley. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the book.

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I follow the Goodreads rating policy:
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ - Lifelong favourite!
⭐⭐⭐⭐ - I loved the book.
⭐⭐⭐ - I liked the book.
⭐⭐ - I found the book average.
⭐ - I hated the book.
The decimals indicate the degree of the in-between feelings.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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[Aly · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a quiet but impactful read that follows a 12-year-old slowly revealing who she really is as the story unfolds and she begins to unravel. I loved the question and answer and diary format. It felt intimate and immediate, capturing her voice at that moment in time. Experiencing the complexities of life through the eyes of someone on the edge of adolescence was both heartbreaking and insightful, especially her obsession with numbers as something predictable in a life she can’t control. The slow descent brought on by isolation, grief, and the loss of self was unsettling in the best way, making this a layered story that truly lingers.

Thank you to Literary Press Group of Canada for an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

[Vikki · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nora Gold's Doubles is a heartbreaking and deeply unsettling novella that examines what happens when a child is abandoned by the very people who are supposed to protect her.

Set in 1968 and narrated by a vibrant twelve-year-old girl with a love of mathematics, the story follows her six-month stay in an institution for troubled youth after the death of her mother. What makes the novel so devastating is that she never feels like a troubled child at all. She feels like a grieving, neurodivergent girl whose intelligence and emotional needs are repeatedly misunderstood by the adults around her.

Mathematics becomes both her refuge and her language. Throughout the novel, she uses lessons and concepts from her studies to make sense of the confusing and often painful world around her. Her observations are sharp, thoughtful, and frequently heartbreaking, especially because she is so innocent. No one explains things to her. No one teaches her how to navigate social situations. Instead, she is left to interpret a world that consistently rejects and isolates her.

After losing her mother at only twelve years old, she is institutionalized by a father who cannot cope with her differences. The message she receives from the adults in her life is devastatingly clear: she is a problem to be managed rather than a child to be loved. When affection and attention finally come her way, they arrive in unhealthy forms. Deprived of genuine connection, she gradually begins to mirror the behaviors of those around her, searching for belonging wherever she can find it. The transformation from a quiet, polite girl into someone viewed as delinquent feels less like a fall from grace and more like a predictable consequence of neglect.

One of the novel's most powerful elements is the concept of the "double" she creates in her mind. This imagined version of herself lives the life she should have had—the life she lost when she was sent away. As her pain grows, she retreats further into this internal world, finding comfort there when reality offers little but loneliness and disappointment.

What struck me most was watching her enter puberty within the confines of this institution. As her body undergoes enormous changes and her thoughts become increasingly complex, angry, and dark, her journal entries seem to shrink. The contrast is striking. The world around her grows smaller, her voice becomes quieter, and she withdraws deeper into herself just as the emotional weight she carries becomes almost unbearable. Gold captures the confusion of adolescence with remarkable sensitivity while simultaneously showing the damage caused by isolation and neglect.

The writing itself is exceptional. Gold's prose is elegant without sacrificing authenticity, and the mathematical motifs woven throughout the story elevate the narrative rather than distract from it. Numbers, equations, and patterns become tools the protagonist uses to understand a world that repeatedly fails to make sense. Her intelligence shines through every page, making her situation all the more heartbreaking.

What makes Doubles linger long after its final page is its refusal to offer easy answers. The novella ends without providing certainty about the protagonist's future, and I found myself deeply frustrated by its brevity. I wanted more. I wanted to know what happened to her. I wanted reassurance that she eventually found the understanding, support, and belonging she was denied as a child.

Yet that unresolved ending may be one of the novel's greatest strengths. The ending almost forces the reader to do what society failed to do for her: care what happens next. Rather than providing closure, Gold leaves readers sitting with the same uncertainty, fear, and longing that have defined the protagonist's experience. By the final page, the question is no longer why she changed, but whether anyone will finally see her for who she is.

Thought-provoking, emotionally devastating, and beautifully written, Doubles is a powerful exploration of grief, neurodivergence, institutionalization, and the human need for connection. Despite its short length, it leaves a lasting impact and raises difficult questions about how society treats vulnerable children. It is a novella that broke my heart—and one I won't soon forget.

[Malcolm Van · Rating 5 out of 5]

Note: I was given a ARC for review.

Doubles is a sixty-page novella, a quick read, something you can start and finish in a few hours. Once started, you’ll probably rip through it like I did. The delightfully clearheaded, funny narrator pulls you through her story, tugging at your heartstrings while you hope, hope, hope, like she does, comprehending that the probability is almost zero that these hopes will be realized, as she does.

Written as diary entries, though we start with six questions a counsellor asks the unnamed narrator at the group home she’s in. The narrator’s twelve years old. She loves math; like, she relates everything in her life to numbers. When she grows up, she wants to be a prime number, for example. Her dad calls her a zero—which she’s OK with, in the way we’re all OK with whatever we’ve been told about ourselves in the safety of our private thoughts, or journals.

As Doubles progresses, we piece together why this youngster is at Valleyview Children’s Farm, even if she does not quite understand it herself and just wants to go home. Valleyview is viciously uninspiring. The kids have no school lessons; the library has only one math textbook, which our narrator works her way through in no time. When she requests volume two, it never arrives: it costs too much.

She and her fellow prisoners—she never sees herself and her fellow children’s farm denizens as anything but prisoners—can’t leave; if they run away, they get solitary confinement. But at least at a prison, they'd get schooling and things to do aside from leafing through old car and fashion magazines or staring at Disney TV. The narrator and her fellow children’s farm captives sit together in a common room, never allowed to be away from the watchful (or not so watchful) eyes of their counsellors. Other kids stare at their hands, slap themselves in the face or attempt pranks for which they get tackled to the ground and, you guessed it, hauled off to solitary confinement. Towards the end of the book, the narrator gets pretty good at staring herself.

Her future looks bleak. If only she could get that math textbook, and keep studying!

Reading Doubles, you get a sense of how kids in 1960s child services systems had basically zero chance of becoming anything other than, if they were lucky, the working poor. You see the dangers around Doubles’ narrator, and how there’s no way she’s going to escape all of them; for one, she’s too young to recognize most.

The ending is perfect and, in a way, redemptive. Hopeful. Some people go through fire and come out solid, strong and untouchable. They go in a fraction and come out a prime number.

This novella is fantastic: well-written, great pacing and tension, with a sharp and unwittingly witty narrator.

[Emily Dacho · Rating 5 out of 5]

In Nora Gold’s novel, Doubles, a twelve-year-old protagonist is undergoing difficult times. The number of parents in her family has shrunk from two to one, dogs to zero, and with her sister also gone, home has drastically changed. She feels trapped, caged even. She’s in two places, of course, physically in one.

Nora’s protagonist loves math, though not so good at it. Math explains a lot, especially of the events and things around which her life orbits. Math helps her make sense of things. She wishes to become a prime number. “6, for instance, is the number of people who were our family until 10 months ago. 3 was the number of parts in that family. 5 is the number of people in our family now.”

About this protagonist, there’s more. Of great interest is her relationship with her father. Of course, they don’t get along. She loves him all the same. Can’t imagine him in prison. She sees herself as a helpless being forever institutionalised, and a free being living with her family. She imagines what life awaits her outside while caught up in her present predicament. Her story is sad, and she’s totally in charge of it, telling it from her own distinct voice.

It’s intriguing how she handles hope. When her chance of getting out of the institution is squashed, she’s profoundly devastated, but then she gathers herself up and soldiers on, brave but afraid inside, hopeful but not so much.

Also interesting and quite commendable of Nora is the dialogue, especially between the narrator and her sister. They’re discussing pregnancy; the narrator is inquisitive as you’d expect, shooting one question after the other, and the sister is too smart for her, managing her just fine. Nora talks tragedy with precision, and through her young protagonist, the viewpoint is unique, vivid, and very unfiltered.

Ultimately, Nora crafts a family story that asks whether most parents do enough for their children and whether institutions are ideal for troubled children. Adult readers have a book to read here. The young adults, too.

[Carla Stockton · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nora Gold’s intriguing novella Doubles contains a number of compelling double dilemmas. The young woman at the helm of the story is nameless—and for good reason: her anonymity makes her emblematic of her time, place, and circumstances. She lives amid the turbulence of 1968, when the world feels unmoored and her family has fallen apart. She reveals just enough to draw us in: She lives in an institution called Valleyview Children’s Farm, her mother is dead, and her father’s physical violence has led to her removal from her home. Her younger brother and her grandmother are still at home and need her, yet her sister, the “good” daughter, has become pregnant and fled home to escape their father, who claims she is his favorite. These family and societal complexities create a compelling tension that carries the reader forward.

Doubles unfolds as a riveting stream of consciousness: the inner landscape of a precocious, sensitive, math-loving pre-teen searching for identity and meaning. The questions she asks, and the conclusions she reaches, are insightful and often moving. She is fascinated by contradictions – for example, that World War II was supposed to be the war that ended all wars, but didn’t, that she admires bravery yet her own fears often hold her back. Sketched beautifully and vividly by Gold, this girl reminds us of the complexity of life as experienced by a sensitive young person faced with its many paradoxes, including the inconsistencies and hypocrisies of the adults in charge.

Doubles invites readers into the deeply engaging and often humorous world of a remarkably perceptive pre-teen, and it offers, through Gold’s powerful and unsentimental writing about childhood, insights, truths, and some tantalizing pleasures.

[Tulip_OnTheTBR · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Numbers don’t lie, but they aren't everything either."

As a former math major, I was SO excited to dive into the mind of a 12-year-old math prodigy! 🧮 I totally related to her "math-brain"; numbers are the truth! But man, even for a math lover, this was a heavy, and at times overwhelming, journey into a 1968 institution for troubled youth.

I found this one a bit hard to get through. The story is told through a series of journal entries, and while I get why the author chose that format, it just didn't flow cohesively for me. I kept looking at the page count wondering when we’d reach the end because it felt like it was missing something to pull all the thoughts and events together into a solid plot.

The incident that landed our narrator (did anyone else catch her name? Because I sure didn’t! 🤔) in this facility was incredibly heartbreaking. It’s a quiet, haunting kind of sad because you realize this happens every day; nameless children all over the world becoming "children of the system," forgotten and unloved. While the book frames her journey as a transformation from a "good girl" to a "delinquent," I felt there was a bit of embellishing going on here. You’ll have to be the judge of that yourself!

The ending really left a lot to be desired. It wasn’t a bad read, but it didn't quite stick the landing for me.

I give it 3-stars which isn't bad at all. If you love mathematics or stories about social history, it’s worth a look for the unique perspective, but the rhythm might be a challenge!

Thank you to NetGalley and Guernica Editions for providing this ARC in exchange for my honest review!

[Adrienne · Rating 5 out of 5]

This story was a deep dive into the mind of a twelve year old girl thrust into a children's farm because of circumstances her young mind cannot understand. You only get the story from her perspective but this was such a deep book that draws the reader in immediately. On one level, she understands why she was taken away, but her youth makes it impossible to accept why she was the one sent away versus her parent. So much is revealed and not revealed through her journal entries, which was beautifully done, as it gave the reader insight to everything going on that the girl herself didn't know. I personally enjoy when writers are able to pull something like that off in a story. It made me want to see more. I especially loved her "double" moment after her sister's visit. The description says she goes from a quiet girl to a delinquent but I would disagree with this. She is quiet the entire time and withdraws within herself, choosing to observe the world in the end than be part of it. Her connection with numbers was an interesting way for her to remain a little connected with the world but also to rationalize and understand everything goin on around her. It was also an interesting focus to the story overall, her obsession with math and numbers. I thought her character was funny, smart and innocent all at the same time, yet also sad and dark too. She was a typically preteen in a lot of ways and not in others, simply based on the cards dealt to her in life. I honestly wanted to read more and get more snippets into her mind and life and what would happen next. She and the style of writing drew me in immediately and I would highly recommend this.

[Paige Moulton · Rating 5 out of 5]

Doubles by Nora Gold is a historical literary novella that explores life inside a 1968 youth institution through the sharp, observant perspective of a gifted twelve-year-old girl whose identity is shaped by mathematics, discipline, and emotional suppression.

One of the most compelling aspects of the book is its narrative voice. The protagonist’s intelligence and mathematical fixation provide a distinctive lens through which the institutional environment is interpreted, creating a voice that feels both analytical and emotionally layered.

The setting plays a critical role in shaping the story’s tone and themes. The youth institution becomes more than a backdrop, functioning instead as a structured environment that gradually influences behavior, identity, and moral boundaries over time.

A particularly strong element of the novella is its portrayal of transformation. The gradual shift from a “good girl” persona into delinquency is handled with psychological nuance, emphasizing environmental pressure and emotional response rather than simplistic behavioral change.

The historical context adds additional weight to the narrative, especially in light of modern awareness surrounding institutional treatment of youth during that era. This grounding enhances the story’s relevance and emotional impact.

For readers who enjoy literary fiction with historical depth, psychological development, and character driven narratives centered on youth and institutional life, Doubles offers a concise and thought provoking reading experience.

[Michele Dawson Haber · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an extraordinary novella – surprising, multi-layered, and so well written. Gold takes unconventional risks in this story and every single one of them work out. First, we never learn the name of our main protagonist, but that doesn’t prevent us from knowing and relating to her on a deep level. Second, because it is structured as journal entries, we enter the protagonist’s world through her reflections and self-reporting, rather than scenes and dialogue. Incredibly, Gold constructs a multi-layered and fully populated narrative this way and she does so from the perspective of an unreliable child narrator. Throughout the story, we witness the dichotomy of a girl who doesn’t understand what is going on around her and also understands all too well. There are so many dichotomies/doubles in this book, and I loved how the author weaved math throughout. Gold resists a happy ending, though the reader desperately wants one for the brilliant and sensitive girl they’ve rooted for and come to love. But we also recognize that it can’t be otherwise. The protagonist has grown out of her innocent love for the invariability and rationality of numbers to recognizing the world is not a zero-sum game, but irrational and duplicitous. Will she be forever damaged by this realization or will she find the power that exists within her to change the equation? The girl and her story will stay with me for a long time, and that is what I call a good book. Brava, Nora Gold!

[A Mac · Rating 4 out of 5]

This literary fiction novella follows a young girl who is sent to a state-run children's institution for her own safety. This influences how the work is set up, as a series of answers to weekly journaling questions the MC is asked to answer. I loved this approach, as it is much fresher than the "dear diary" setup but still lets the stream-of-consciousness and inner thoughts of the MC fill the page. The MC is also highly focused on math and numbers, which of course plays a big role in her musings and answers to the questions. This was highly creative, and more interesting than I usually find math.

Even with this approach, the characters are well developed and come to life throughout, which is a testament to the author's skill. The MC's character growth was also well written, and plainly evident through the shifts in her mindset over the six months of her writing. Seeing everyone through the young MC's perception didn't necessarily create a nuanced view of the characters, but it made the story feel even more realistic.

If you like coming-of-age literary fiction with some darker themes, then this is well worth reading. My thanks to NetGalley and Literary Press Group of Canada for allowing me to read this work. All thoughts and opinions expressed in this review are my own.

And thank you to Rosh for posting such a compelling review about this one and putting it on my radar!

[Angela · Rating 4 out of 5]

I originally decided to read this book because of the beautiful cover a the summary, but was surprised by the way the book is structured and the POV.

This book is difficult to rate and leaves you guessing about both what’s happened and how it ends, but there’s a certain beauty and sadness in the guessing that reflects real life.

Pacing
Fast-paced and told in first person through diary entries. Time flow is disjointed and whenever the narrator feels like making an entry, but somehow it captures all of the important pieces of daily life that we as readers need to know. The pacing becomes more faster and frantic as time goes on, mirroring the narrator’s descent into apathy.

Characters
We never learn the name of our narrator, but we do learn about what matters to her, her family and ultimately how she ended up in a “home” and the system. The narration is very well done, perfectly believable to be reading what’s been thought in the mind of a 12 year old battling with her own demons and the progression of those thoughts as she lives in the home. It’s heartbreaking to witness the loss of her freedom and care.

Thank you to the NetGalley Team and Nora Gold for giving me the opportunity to read this ARC.

[Lucy Black · Rating 5 out of 5]

Doubles: A Novella by Nora Gold is a heart-breaking narrative about a twelve-year-old girl coming to terms with abuse, grief and loneliness. Told in first person, the young narrator has been removed from her family home and placed in the institutional Valleyview Home to keep her safe. Gold’s academic career includes research in the area of child welfare, which is poignantly applied in exposing the limitations of such institutions and the depersonalizing experiences that are the hallmark of such long-term care. The vulnerable narrator attempts to navigate the pivot from a happy life on a small farm to an uneasy setting where she is surrounded by other traumatized young people and a revolving door of caregivers. Something of a math prodigy, she is further frustrated when challenging math textbooks are not provided. She questions why she is locked away and isolated when it is her father who should have been restrained and punished. Beautifully written, the narrator’s voice is both convincing and haunting. Gold has challenged her readers with an insightful expose that will linger long after reading it. Recommended.

[Kelsey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Doubles by Nora Gold
Rating: 4/5 stars
I was drawn to this book originally because of the unique cover art but stayed because of the great story line. The book follows a young unnamed girl as she journeys through being in a institution for troubled youth.
This is a very heartbreaking novella. It really explores the effect of how your environment shapes who you become. Her obsession with number seems to be the only thing consistent in her life. You are able to experience the loss of herself in a diary setting, The ages of our narrator is shown through her quick jumping between her thoughts and the reality of her situation. The author did an excellent job of portraying writing of a young girl without it being too much.
The enjoyment of Doubles is solely based on the preference of the reader. Since it is written in a format of diary entries, it reminds me of the Diary of Anne Frank. While the book is well written, it just wasn't my style of book.
Thank you NetGalley for allowing me to be an ARC reader!

[Natalie · Rating 3 out of 5]

This one is difficult rate. There was a lot I enjoyed and found interesting about this however, my rating is based on my overall enjoyment. If you are a fan of epistolary novels or more stream of consciousness and less structure, I think you should give this a try.

This book just made me unspeakably sad, which I know was the intention, for thousands of children that get lost in the system. Whether that is foster care or child welfare systems in the way this book describes them. It is truly heartbreaking in the U.S. (and I am sure in other places, just speaking of what I know) that so little help existed for such a long time. That we can have computers writing emails and self driving cars but have not figured out a way to provide an adequate level of care while also maintaining dignity to millions of people.

If this book is for you, you will love it. It wasn't my cup of tea but that is just down to preferences.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the ARC

[Donna Costello · Rating 4 out of 5]

DOUBLES is an intriguing story told through a series of journal entries by a twelve-year-old girl who is thrust into an institution for troubled youth. The format works well as it gives the reader time to absorb what is happening without breaking the pace of the novella.
Parts of this remind me of Mark Haddon’s THE CURIOUS INCIDENT OF THE DOG IN THE NIGHT-TIME due to the main character’s fixation with numbers and the way she observes the world. It makes for an interesting and unique reading experience, especially as it explores the topic of mental health and isolation. I very much enjoyed the read.
I would certainly recommend this, but I do think the author has priced themselves incorrectly which is why readers may be hesitant to pick it up. As a writer of novellas myself I know that that anything around 94 pages is a much lower price (usually around 2.99) so readers may be reluctant to invest in something with less pages than a regular novel for a higher price.

[BiblioPeeks · Rating 5 out of 5]

"All I've learned in this place so far is how to stay out of the way of crazy people."

A precocious, curious, and clever twelve-year-old girl is put into a home for delinquent children—much to her dismay and confusion. She's a math prodigy and sees the world in numbers, which is how she attempts to make sense of her surroundings and the aspects of her life not in her control.

The novella unfolds as a writing exercise an instructor gives the girl in which she must answer questions. Over the course of the story, how she came to be there is revealed, as is the devastating effect being there has on her mind. I grew quite attached to her from the very first answer she gave—chuckling throughout at her wit and spunk. Nora Gold is a masterfully poetic writer, deep diving into uncomfortable themes—within this 68-page novella—with literary precision, showcasing depth and humor alike.

DOUBLES is an endearing yet heartbreaking tale about a bright, good-natured child who is displaced into an institutional system and irrevocably affected for the worse. Though this story is set in 1968, its message about disaffected youth is timeless, relevant, and poignant. Expect to read this in one engaging and captivating sitting. You'll laugh, you'll cringe, you'll hope, and ultimately you'll be happy you spent time with this plucky girl and her worldview!
____


Thank you Nora Gold for my gifted copy. All opinions are my own.

[Al Robi · Rating 3 out of 5]

Counting on Something Steadier Than People

Set in the 1960s, this brief but powerful novella follows a young girl whose world unravels after the loss of her mother and the growing violence of her father. Removed from her home and placed in a facility, she learns to rely on the one thing that never fails her—numbers. Math becomes her refuge, its logic and certainty far more dependable than the adults around her.

The story is largely contained within the walls of the institution, where we experience the world through her sharp, fast-moving thoughts. Her mind jumps quickly from idea to idea, yet everything feels intentional, clear, and deeply reasonable. The narrative voice is distinctive and compelling, drawing you into her inner logic and quiet resilience.

With an ending I didn’t see coming, this novella delivers an emotional punch in a short space. A quick, thoughtful read that lingers after the final page.

Thank you NetGalley for the ARC.

[Viga Boland · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have a confession to make: the book description of DOUBLES made me curious but hesitant: It just didn't sound like something I'd enjoy. But then I read that this novella had been long-listed for the prestigious Canadian Giller Book Prize. I had to find out what made this short book about a 12-year-old who sees the world around her in mathematical terms so special. Once I began reading, I forgot the world around me as I was caught up in her almost magical thinking, her simple conversations with herself, her deep reflections on her life so far, the obnoxious father who had decided to institutionalize her, and her increasing loneliness. What makes a child come to see herself as a zero? In my humble opinion, DOUBLES is profound, sadly beautiful, and definitely worthy of book awards. So glad I read it!

[Caroline Musyoka · Rating 5 out of 5]

When I first grabbed Doubles, I didn’t know what to expect. The story sounded interesting to me. It is about a twelve-year-old girl who understands the world through numbers. But I was not sure how much depth a short novella could have. I quickly realized that this book was about much more than mathematics. I found a touching, thoughtful story that stayed with me long after I finished reading.

The thing that impressed me most was how well the author wrote from a child's point of view. The narrator gets some things but misses others, and that gap between what she knows and what the reader picks up makes it really emotional. Watching her gradually lose parts of herself while waiting for answers that might never arrive was deeply heartbreaking. Her journey feels so real, and her quiet strength made me really care about her.

[Briann Shear · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nora Gold can pack a lot into 85 pages. Not every child has an easy easy time growing up. The narrator/protagonist of Gold’s novella Doubles is an unnamed twelve-year-old girl who is in an institution for troubled kids. She reveals her story in bits and pieces, her longing to be with family, her sense that it was circumstances that put her in this grim and depressing place with an ever-changing cast of care-givers, her search for answers to the “why” questions she struggles to answer. She is clearly intelligent and loves numbers and math, which seem so concrete and reliable. Gold beautifully writes in this complex character’s voice. As I read my affection for the character grew, along with my hope that her inner strength would save her. Emotional and powerful writing .

[Lawrence Lawson · Rating 2 out of 5]

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for early access in exchange for an honest review.

This is a story of a math prodigy in an institution, and it’s told both through the narrator’s answers to some questionnaire prompts and through diary entries. This is a slim work, an afternoon’s read, but it’s chock full of details.

And, for me, that was the problem. There were so many details—of people, of locations, of math problems, of affinity for numbers—but they weren’t anchored to character or plot in any engaging way (for me). For a lot of this read, I found myself saying: so what? There wasn’t much narrative coherence for me.

That said, this is a creative and unique work. It’s worth a read for folks who are interested in the premise of this work.

[Tracey Madeley · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a beautiful book about a young girl who is obsessed with numbers. They are her source of comfort and structure in her life. She is 12 and has been placed in a children’s home after being assaulted by her father. The only visit she gets from her family is from her sister, who explains she is leaving home because she is pregnant. We see her frustration at the lack of provision of any education, refusing to purchase a new maths book as it is deemed too expensive. Her reactions to other pupils and staff are non-judgmental, just presenting the facts, the delinquent behaviour and high staff turnover. The ending comes to a stop without any real conclusion or end to her situation, which is a little frustrating.

[Helen Wu ✨ · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.25

Going in, I kept wondering if she was in jail or detention. I was not prepared for how brutal the environment actually was. The author captures a 12 year old voice so well that I forgot I was reading fiction. Everything is filtered through her logic, her humor, her confusion, and it makes the cruelty feel even sharper. This place is supposed to protect children, yet it reads like a prison. That contrast is haunting. Set in 1968, but it does not feel distant. I do not know what the system looks like now, but I found myself hoping, almost pleading, that it is better than what these kids endured.

Thank you NetGalley and Literary Press Group of Canada for the ARC!

[Noha Badawi · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are books you read, and then there are books you live through. This was one of them. A rare reading experiences that felt deeply intimate and emotional. Following an unnamed girl's journey through life and from her own eyes made every moment hit harder; her loneliness, confusion, resilience, and quiet observations of a world that consistently failed her. Despite its short length, this novella carries remarkable emotional weight, immersing the reader so completely in her perspective that it feels less like reading a story and more like sharing a piece of her life. Heartbreaking, thoughtful, and unforgettable.

[Donna Emperador · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hard to put down

DOUBLES is written in journal format from the perspective of a twelve year old girl. It is a heart-wrenching story about a girl removed from her family in the 60s and placed in a children's home. It is a commentary on how sometimes well-meaning systems negatively affect those they are trying to help.

The book is a quick read, almost too quick. I would have liked to know what happened next.

While the story is told from the perspective of a twelve year old, the subject matter is more geared towards older teens and adults.