Review – Northern Soul

I was lucky enough to request and receive an early copy of this in exchange for an honest review. All views and opinions are my own.

This is one of the funniest books I’ve read in ages (not least because Earle has taken the Earle-Montgomery Twitter Croc-gate to the page 😂) and in a time when it seems compulsory for all teen/YA to be romance, crime, fantasy or a combination of the three it was hugely refreshing too.

OK, this is sort of a love story, but it’s a fairly one-sided one, and while some of the moves Marv makes, on the advice of Yorkshire’s Otis Redding (yeah, you read that right), are questionably romantic, it’s safe to say this is no romance novel.

Rather, this is the story of 14 year old Marv, who up until this point has only been interested in football, music and hanging out with best mate Jimmy. But all that changes when new girl Carly moves in down the road (prompting one of my favourite exchanges in the book, which nearly saw my morning coffee spat all over the staffroom).

Marv is smitten, but has no clue what to do about it. Luckily for him though, a decidedly northern, kebab-eating Otis Redding turns up in his room one night to help guide him in the ways of the heart and help him to win Carly’s.

Cue a catalogue of cringe-worthy encounters that are guaranteed to crack you up, including – but very much not limited to – spin the bottle, shared ear phones, braces, busking and probably the best chat up line ever (which is still making me laugh now a week or so later).

You will spend much of this book with your stomach tightening in a knot of “oh god, no…he’s not…he can’t…don’t do it… I can’t look”-ness, but there’s also some really lovely moments of friendship (who but your very best mate would agree to busk a self-written song, outside a bakers with a very unmusical you?), some very tender moments of teenage emotional confusion, awkward father-son relations and the bitter-sweetness of getting over that first crush too.

Funny, honest, real (the ending is spot on) and did I mention funny? A must-read for teenagers and anyone who ever was one.