You've Got a Friend
This is the third book in the series about Molly and Beth, the thirteen-year-old best friends and latterly step-sisters who travel back in time. Molly is worried that her dad – who is separated from her mum – is too lonely. He’s recently returned from Africa to be near his daughter and it’s tough for him living alone, especially compared to how happy Molly is in her new extended family of Beth and her dad (who’s in a relationship with Molly’s mum).
So the two girls return to Molly’s dad’s childhood – the seventies, an era brilliantly captured on the book’s psychedelic pink cover by illustrator Rachel Corcoran with cassette tapes, platform soles, tartan scarves and coloured beads. Molly goes back to when her dad was just seven years old, learns all about him and is able to improve his life as a result. However, it’s harder for the two pals to understand the strange misconceptions about women and their abilities, which everyone seemed to accept as normal back then. In this thoroughly modern tale, Curtin’s writing is full of her trademark warmth and passion, and she once again displays her skill in capturing precisely the way young girls think and speak. There’s plenty of excitement and the normally quieter Molly has to be particularly brave, realising by the book’s end that parents are still just people, who might occasionally need your help.
