Lost and Found (Atheneum, 2008) is another fun school story by Andrew Clements (author of one of my all-time favorite books–Frindle).  Lost and Found tells the story of two identical twins, Ray and Jay, who move to a new school.  Since Ray is sick on the first day of school, Jay attends alone and quickly realizes that the school has accidentally combined their files.  No one at school knows there are two boys. 

For the first time in his life, Jay is seen solely as an individual rather than as part of a pair.  It is fantastic.  He tells Ray they should keep up the ruse:  ”I mean, think of it, Ray–every other day you could stay home!  And do whatever you wanted to.  And when you do go to school, you’ll be completely on your own there.  You’ve got to try it out Ray.  No offense or anything, but not being a twin?  At school?  It’s really great.”

The boys hatch a scheme and take turns going to school.  No one knows–not their parents, not their teacher, not the school administrators.  The plan starts to crack, though, when the boys individuality starts seeping through.  One is good at math but the other is a great soccer player.  One is a natural ladies man while the other is more reticent.  The boys may look alike, but they are two very different people.  And much to their surprise, instead of being able to be more of an individual, they have to start pretending to be more like each other.

As I read, I was reminded of my father-in-law, also an identical twin.  He and his brother never tried Ray and Jay’s trick, but they did sometimes switch classes to trick their teachers.  Perhaps bait and switch just comes with identical twin territory.