Friends Like These

LoveReading Says

Into a brief, hot summer slice of late adolescence, award-winning Meg Rosoff brilliantly unpacks a friendship which leads to a sequence of rollercoaster and heady experiences for eighteen year old Beth.

Newly arrived in New York to take up a journalism internship, Beth is immediately swept up by her fellow interns including Eddie, an attractive, talented and rich New Yorker who invites her to move into her parents beautiful and comfortable home. Eager to leave the cockroach infested apartment, her first home on arrival, Beth is entranced by Eddie, whose extraordinary life has already ensured her familiarity with all the experiences - sex, drugs, drink - that are new to Beth.

Their heady days together appear to be a reflection of the best friendship in the world. But is it?

As the summer gets hotter, the drinks get stronger and her sense of what she should be doing gets more confused, Beth begins to realise that Eddie is not the friend she seems to be. No one captures the importance of friendship and the turmoil of coming of age better than Meg Rosoff.

Reviewed by Julia Eccleshare M.B.E.
Julia Eccleshare has spent her working life to date within children’s books as a critic, an editor, an author and a commentator.
More reviews by Julia Eccleshare M.B.E.

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