FOR the second year running, Tavistock College students have won the Carnegie Shadowing Competition, beating 11 other local schools.

For the competition, this year held at Hele’s School in Plymouth, participants could be from any year group but needed to be committed readers. A book from those short-listed for the National Carnegie Award for authors is allocated to each school which then has to present the ‘essence’ of the book in under eight minutes.

Tavistock College was allocated the book ’One’ by Sarah Crossan. The story is moving and unusual and tells the shocking story of conjoined twins who have to face the challenges of attending school and finding friends, along with the decision making surrounding their possible surgical separation — a complex and dangerous operation which could save one or both lives, or the reverse.

The college team comprised Rosie Alexander, Emily Handel, Thanae Garland Tsirka, Ben Moran, Beau Waycott, Charlotte Davis, Issey Hillman, Joe Dix and Lucia Bellamy.

A spokesperson for the college said: ‘Such a storyline posed the college some challenges. After much discussion and false starts, the students chose to represent the emotion and message of the novel; namely that the girls are typical teenagers and they share a deep love for each other.

‘Our quite stark and at times brutally honest presentation included a disturbing bullying scene, a conversation where the twins plan their funeral, a thoroughly teenage event with pizza and chips and finally their separation depicted by the untying and letting go of the single red ribbon by which they were joined.

‘As the red ribbon was stretched across the stage and our students sang the lines "Like a Bridge Over Troubled Water, I Will Lay Me Down" we all heard the audience gasp and some even muttered “no”. The sense of love and loss contained in the novel had clearly been conveyed.’

Sarah Jones, principal at the college, said: ‘It was very emotional and the group did achieve their aim of making the audience cry! The book deserved such tears and our students knew how to show this and convey the message of deep love with skill and empathy.’

There was a live link to the Carnegie Awards in London and the students were thrilled to see Sarah Crossan also pick up the author’s award for this brutally honest and moving novel.