Looking for Alibrandi

A technical gripe: I listened to this in the car and the audio version cuts off the last three sentences of the novel. Way to leave me hanging!

But it's an interesting story, won a ton of awards etc etc. Very interesting to hear about schooling in Australia. The voice of narrator Josie seems quite fresh, despite the book being written in 1991. It is funny when she mentions things like Country Road jeans and Esprit clothing.

Looking for Alibrandi takes me to a part of Australia I didn't know existed and includes characters I never suspected were part of Australian life. Josephine Alibrandi has never known her father, and the lack of a father is a major problem in her Italian family. Just being from an Italian heritage sets Josephine up for scorn from her solidly Australian friends, and not having a father sets Josephine up for scorn from both her Australian friends and her Italian family.

And then her father comes back into her life.

Josephine is a wonderfully real teen, full of both worries and courage, as she unexpectedly comes to connect with both her dad and other teens.