The Shredded Wheat factory - and the boy who dances there.
First love, last love and all the complicated stuff in between."
review by Maryom
Marnie Fitzpatrick is young and privileged. Her mother was a celebrity hairdresser.Her step-father's a famous actor. She attends the exclusive St Libby's girls' school just outside Welwyn Garden City and has a flair for maths. But ....on one fateful afternoon her life is about to be turned upside down...
Freddie Friday is a young man who wants to dance, but with grandparents to care for sees no way he can realise his dreams. All he has to look forward to is a life of monotonous work at the city's Shredded Wheat plant/
Meanwhile Julie Crewe, Marnie's maths teacher, feels her life is behind her. for six weeks when she was young, she danced barefoot in the park with a young man and fell in love. The relationship and her dancing career crumbled at the same time...and nothing since has ever lived up to those few precious weeks.
Love Notes for Freddie is at heart a bitter-sweet teen-romance/coming of age story in which Eva Rice re-visits that time in life when it seems anything and everything could happen. Too old to be classed as children, too young to be set in adult ways, Freddie and Marnie are at a time of their lives when the possibilities opening for them seem endless. Julie Crewe, on the other hand, just moving into her forties, represents what happens when those possibilities DON'T materialise. The message behind the story is definitely one of 'cease the day'; if a chance offers itself, grab it!
I was a little disappointed that the story of Marnie's school-rebel friend Rachel wasn't explored more. Marnie seems to just take life as it comes, accepting both good and bad as they're thrown at her; Rachel is very much one who takes life and shapes it round her, and I think she had a more interesting story to tell.
Maryom's review - 4 stars
Publisher - Quercus
Genre - teen/ YA
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