Meet Rowena Vincent: trainee mortician, aspiring beautician, serial shoplifter and Warrior Princess. Holed up with her mum in a Newcastle suburb and living on a steady diet of Baileys and chips, Rowena fantasises about her absent dad and plans her funeral music. But when she embarks on an energetic campaign to eliminate her mothers new boyfriend, Bernard Filthy Luker, Rowena starts to lose her slippery grip on reality and is packed of to a teenage therapy group. Meet The Madolescents… Fresh, bittersweet and anarchic, The Madolescents is a gloriously subversive black comedy.
‘It cracks along and, to put it mildly, the hot, anarchic humour scythes through some weird scenarios. The author is a born writer: blackly hilarious, biting and not nice’Sunday Times Culture
‘Most compelling of all is Rowena herself. She is more than enough to carry this original, moving novel and give it the cult classic status it deserves. It is impossible to read this book without falling in love with her, biker boots and all, and more people need to fall in love with girls like Rowena. As for Bridget Jones and all those other over-indulged whiney bints that eat fancy scran and count their tabs, Rowena Vincent would kick them into the middle of next week, and good riddance too.’ The Guardian
‘Over the top and very funny, this could do really well…’ The Bookseller
‘Rowena is a compelling mix of jagged, razor-sharp sanity and genuine madness. At her best she is a “kick-ass angel” and a Warrior Princess.’ Scotland on Sunday
‘This book is simply irresistible.’ Newcastle Evening Chronicle
‘From one of the most original new voices to emerge in years, this is an anarchic black comedy which looks destined to be a cult best seller.’ Lancashire Evening Post
‘The writing in this exceptional first novel is confident and skilful, moving as it does between laugh-out-loud black comedy and painful character observation to a bleaker vision of how easy it is to lose your grip on reality. The Newcastle setting will delight locals, but with its vibrancy and out-right hilarity this novel has much more to recommend it.’ The North Guide