FRANKIE

A gripping, darkly funny novel about searching for the truth, finding yourself and falling in love, from a fresh new voice in Australian fiction.

Frankie Vega is angry. Just ask the guy whose nose she broke. Or the cop investigating the burglary she witnessed, or her cheating ex- boyfriend or her aunt who's tired of giving second chances...

When a kid shows up claiming to be Frankie's half-brother it opens the door to a past she doesn't want to remember.

And when that kid goes missing, the only person willing to help is a boy with his own secrets... and stupidly blue eyes.

Frankie's search for the truth might change her life or cost her everything.

Frankie is a masterfully written, genre-hopping YA novel that is part crime/mystery novel, part comedy and part moving coming-of-age story, all set on the gritty streets of Melbourne.

Frankie is one of the funniest, strongest, most relatable young women in local YA literature. Her search for her brother exposes her to a life she's lived parallel to - a life of squats, graf, petty crime, drugs and homelessness. A life she endured until her mother deserted her at age four and her aunt took her in. Nothing here is two dimensional - each character is finely drawn and very real. And it's unputdownable. The reader is carried through a cracking story by Frankie's clever, entertaining voice. This is a must read.

Shivaun Plozza's short fiction, flash fiction, essays and poetry have appeared in anthologies and journals including Where the Shoreline Used to Be, Above Water, Text, Vivid and The Victorian Writer. When she's not writing, she works as an editor and manuscript assessor. Frankie is her first novel.
shivaunplozza.com twitter.com/ShivaunPlozza.