Peerless Flats
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- $20.99
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- $20.99
Publisher Description
From the acclaimed author of Hideous Kinky, Peerless Flats confirms Freud as one of the best writers about childhood we have
'A delightful read' The Times
'Freud has drawn her characters with great affection and her light touch ensures that a tone of brave sweetness is maintained throughout ... This is the spirit which makes Peerless Flats so touching and enjoyable a novel' Evening Standard
Sixteen-year-old Lisa has high hopes for her first year in London. But squeezed into a temporary council flat with her bohemian mother and a little brother obsessed with foxes, she is not off to the best start.
Ambitious to be more like her elusive, glamorous sister, Ruby, who lives life to the full, Lisa trails through the city, dabbling with drugs and romance, and refusing to lose faith in her belief that something fantastic will happen to mark the rest of her life.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Freud's second novel is a powerfully unconventional portrait of a London teenager struggling to build a life in a broken family plagued by poverty and drugs. Sixteen-year-old Lisa inhabits a derelict building called Peerless Flats with her aimless mother and rambunctious half-brother. Shy and overly responsible, she has always lived in the shadow of her flamboyant older sister, Ruby, a heroin addict who is the obvious favorite of their father, a mysterious figure involved with racetrack gambling. Lisa, who wants to be an actress, tries desperately to make someone care for, or at least notice her. Living in a world where defeated people automatically turn to drugs and alcohol, she becomes obsessed with the thought that someone might slip LSD into her food or drink; eventually she stops eating altogether. Only by renewing her faith in those she loves can she be saved from self-inflicted starvation. Like its predecessor, Hideous Kinky , this novel is short on plot but strong on character and setting. Freud (daughter of painter Lucian and great-granddaughter of Sigmund) depicts in vividly immediate prose Lisa's deterioration as her pleas for love go unheard. With barely a nod to conventionally linear narrative structure, this unusual book is like a beautiful, disturbing painting that renders, on an inutitive level, a troubled young girl's soul. ( Apr. )
