What About Me, Too?

Kate Figes

Description

In this delightful sequel to What About Me?, we are a year on... Sue is a GP, her busy life filled with demanding but lovable patients, demanding but lovable children, a husband and a new dog. But she has just enough time to notice the rather gorgeous neighbour who walks his black lab in the park. Frankie is about to do her GCSEs, and is absolutely certain that no one is as stressed as she is, nor as in love, nor as confused. Lola is eleven, and endearingly aware of those around her, including all her friends (and whether they are, or not), her Granny, her pain-in-the-neck but scrumptious new baby brother, and the fact that her Dad is spending a lot of time texting. And when she sneaks a peek at his calls, there are far too many to someone called Laura. Suddenly, Lola feels overburdened with guilt and responsibility, so just what is she to do? What About Me, Too? is a searingly honest account of life in a normal London household, of how perceptive children can be, and how the dismantling of a marriage can be both devastating and liberating at once.

Informations

• Publié par: eBookPartnership.com
• Date de parution: 01 avril 2011
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780956836878
• Langue: English

Extrait

What About Me, Too?
One toddler, two teens and a granny...
In this delightful sequel to What About Me? , we are a year on...
Sue is a GP, her busy life filled with demanding but lovable patients, demanding but lovable children, a husband and a new dog. But she has just enough time to notice the rather gorgeous neighbour who walks his black lab in the park.
Frankie is about to do her GCSEs, and is absolutely certain that no one is as stressed as she is, nor as in love, nor as confused.
Lola is eleven, and endearingly aware of those around her, including all her friends (and whether they are, or not), her Granny, her pain-in-the-neck but scrumptious new baby brother, and the fact that her Dad is spending a lot of time texting. And when she sneaks a peek at his calls, there are far too many to someone called Laura. Suddenly, Lola feels overburdened with guilt and responsibility, so just what is she to do?
What About Me, Too? is a searingly honest account of life in a normal London household, of how perceptive children can be, and how the dismantling of a marriage can be both devastating and liberating at once.
'Funny, touching and all too familiar'   Woman & Home
'Entertaining and insightful'   Image
'This shrewd novel offers two different takes on growing up'   You Magazine
'Have just finished What About Me? It was fab. I really got involved with the characters and felt such emotion for Frankie. I understood her angst and it made me look at my teenage son more lovingly when he came home from school. There were times when I wanted to shake Sue and give Matthew a piece of my mind. So thank you for a great novel about family life – and I would say it was a pretty accurate one.' Jan Cotterill
About the Author
Kate Figes is the author of several books about relationships and family life, including Life After Birth , The Terrible Teens , The Big Fat Bitch Book and most recently Couples published in 2010. She is books editor at YOU magazine, the women’s colour supplement at the Mail on Sunday Newspaper and she writes regularly for newspapers and magazines.
You can find out more about Kate on www.katefiges.co.uk
Dear Reader
Dear Reader,
After four years of intense research into adolescence for my book on teenagers – The Terrible Teens (which is published in paperback by Penguin), I needed a little light relief! I am proud of The Terrible Teens . It is a thorough analysis of the difficulties teenagers face growing up today and the problems that poses for their parents. It also helps adults to understand the difference between normal adolescent behaviour (which it is best to ignore) and abnormal behaviour which needs speedy intervention if we are to keep them safe and happy. However the one thing I felt I couldn’t capture in that book was the delicious sense of fun and humour that so many young people have. I adore teenagers and I have loved living with my two teenage daughters, yes it’s true, in spite of the messy bedrooms, the locust like way their friends swoop through the fridge (and occasionally the gin) and the anxieties that kept me awake and imagining the worst whenever they were late home. I wanted to put some of the energy, the life, the humour as well as the angst of teenage life into a novel and the idea for What About Me? and it’s sequel What About Me, Too? was born.
Two very different sides to the same year are presented through the emails of a menopausal mother to her sister in Australia and the diary of her fourteen year old daughter. Because of course, mothers and daughters do see things very differently. In What About Me, Too? Frankie’s younger sister Lola, aged 11 and on the cusp of teenage life herself, adds her own voice and her own perspective to the story.
We have set up a facebook page and we would welcome comments about the books from mothers, fathers, teenagers and young children there. Maybe you also have your own story to tell. What do you like or dislike about being a teenager/mother to a teenager. And have there been times when the two generations in your family have seen things as differently as Sue and Frankie? What does your mother or your daughter not understand about you?
I hope you enjoy the books and look forward to hearing from you With best wishes Kate
Dear Diary,
Wednesday the 4th of September
I start year 6 tomorrow! I have decided to mark this most importantyear by starting a diary. When my big sister Frankie wrote a diary and Mum readit Frankie got so cross she ran away from home. They think I don’t know whathappened but she’s been smoking cigarettes, bunking off school and drinkingvodka till she’s sick, which is really stupid because she has to take GCSEsthis year and they are very, very important. My diary says DIARY in big lettersall over the front. I really like the way I’ve made the Y loop down underneathall the other letters. It’s been lying around the house ALL DAY and nobody’seven noticed. I left it on the kitchen table while everybody was havingbreakfast. I’ve moved it round the house, I even put it on Mum’s bed while shewas changing Tom’s nappy and she didn’t even say, ‘Are you keeping a diary,Lola?’ like mums are supposed to. Maybe it’s not interesting enough. Maybe mylife just isn’t as interesting as Frankie’s or Mum and Dad’s. That’s thetrouble with being a child. No one thinks you have anything to say worthhearing.

Dear Diary,
Still Wednesday the 4th of September
Have just been next door to see what Clare is going to wear on thefirst day back at school but she won’t tell me. She says I’ll copy her, whenhow is that like even possible when she buys really expensive cool designerclothes and we don’t?? But the really weird thing was that I was only there forabout ten minutes when her mum sent me home. She said that Clare had to do somemaths and that Clare was going to be really, really busy from now on so I wasgoing to be seeing a lot less of her except at school. But Clare’s like my BESTFRIEND! We do EVERYTHING together!! I was so upset that I ran home before shecould see me cry. When I told Mum I cried though. I don’t understand what I’vedone to offend her. Mum went mad. She says it’s nothing to do with me andeverything to do with ‘that ghastly woman’. She hates Clare’s mum. She callsher HND (it stands for Her Next Door). She was like so offended on my behalfand kept saying, ‘How dare she? What a terrible thing to say to your ownchild’s best friend,’ and then she wanted to go round and see her, which islike really not what I need before we’ve even gone back to school. I had tostand behind the front door and push her back really hard and shout at her tomake the point that I really, REALLY didn’t want her to go.
Mum says that HND wants Clare to go to a private school and youhave to sit exams for those and she’s probably got her a tutor. Mum says that’swrong, that she’s just trying to buy her a better future. I don’t see whythat’s so bad if she can afford it. Mum’s obsessed with HND. Whenever I ask herto do something for me like buy me new knickers nickers or trainers shesays things like, ‘If the surgery’s not too busy, darling,’ or, ‘Maybe at theweekend,’ which means never. But then she doesn’t just leave it at that. Shehas to put herself down for not having the time to be ‘The Perfect Mum’, unlikeHND who doesn’t work. When to me she is the perfect mum because she’s mine. Butif it’s true, that Clare’s mum’s not going to let us hang out together much,then this is going to be a really, REALLY bad, sad year at school because she’sbeen like my best friend forever, since reception.


From: Sue James Sent: Wednesday 4 September 21:52 To: Angela James Subject: Checking in after a fab two weeks in Greece...
Dearest, one and only sister...
I may be middle-aged with saggy knees, three kids and a marriagewhich can at best be described as stagnant but hey! let’s live a little… That’smy new mantra for life anyway because how else do you endure a moody teenageron her GCSE year, a tween who feels inadequate because she can’t wear Prada, asurprise late baby and an adulterous menopausal husband? Go on holiday alltogether, that’s what you do. Flying anywhere with babies is always fun. Themore kids you have the easier it is to forget one. Left Tom behind in thedeparture lounge because it’s so long since I’ve had a baby that I just got upand walked to the gate when they called our flight. Then concussed him in theplane, banging his head against those panels just above the seats as I stood upto take him to the back to change his nappy... forgivable usually in a mother,but NOT when that mother is also a doctor... so that was two points down on theholiday scorecard of marriage before we’d even got there. Managed to raise itsky-high again through waterskiing because I can still do it and Matthew can’t.He tried several times and strained his groin.
Matthew couldn’t understand why none of us wanted to accompany himon visits to ruins in temperatures close to forty degrees. You’re used to thissort of heat down under but for us Poms just moving from the pool into theshade required Herculean effort. The one time I did go with him we got lost upa dirt track. He refused to stop to ask a man on a moped the way because hecan’t speak Greek and being a man couldn’t even begin to communicate. So I gotout of the car and established where we ought to be, which of course madeMatthew even crosser because he now felt humiliated. When we finally reachedthe ‘sight’ it was the most unprepossessing pile of stones I have ever comeacross and I was just grateful that we had left Frank and Lola behind.
Another significant highlight was discussing feminism with Frankieover a bottle of retsina. Matthew, Lola and Tom did ‘Row Row Row Your BoatGently Down the Stream’ so many times I wanted to capsize them. And then, asthey were doing it one night for the 900th time, Frankie said, ‘What ISfeminism, Mum?’ I nearly jumped out of my skin with excitement. Frank’s conversa