in the backlands of Australia, just to get away!

Liz Allan: In Bloom. 2026. Sceptre

Smells like teen spirit!

Grunge!

Kurt Cobain! Nirvana!

Teens!

(And then - always - the plague harassing teenage girls, boys, too, but in this novel, teens).

This had a very teenage spirited tension, dialogue reliable, plot exactly how it should go.

There is a band, four girls seeking fame, seeking a way out, until there is only three of them. Lily quits the band, quits her school and Mr P, music teacher from Germany and there you have it.

The band with their spirit like Kurt Cobain, clothes like Courtney Love, the ticket out of Vincent,

"capital of teen pregnancies and absent fathers"

is called Bastards (just to take a way the insults they might get - being fatherless girls, tainted by poverty, from single mom households with varied "daddies", the boyfriends, the new children, ever tired mom always working, always cooking, always broke.

For nine months, girl ´s beloved music teacher, Mr P, has been rehearsing the girls for the Battle of the Bands. But then, their lead singer, Lily Lucid, quits and the music teacher is accused of sexual harassment and the three girls starts to investigate. They want to prove him flawless so

The girls skateboard around town tracking suspects and

just in short,

Allan writes well the socioeconomic challenges, youth, poverty, not being heard to a good book.

Enjoyed this !