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The schoolgirl crush that never went away: Absolutely and Forever by Rose Tremain reviewed

A delicate, funny and generous-hearted novel about thwarted love and its aftermath in a 1960s Middle England

16 September 2023

9:00 AM

16 September 2023

9:00 AM

Absolutely and Forever Rose Tremain

Chatto & Windus, pp.192, 16.99

When 15-year-old Marianne Clifford tells her parents that she is in love with 18-year-old Simon Hurst, her mother dismisses it as a schoolgirl crush and her father tells her that she is far too young for a boyfriend and should concentrate on her own life ‘as befits a girl of your age and upbringing’.

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