Amazon.co.uk Review
The Boy Next Door is the third offering from bestselling duo Josie Lloyd and Emlyn Rees. Their previous books, Come Together and Come Again, carved out a niche in the popular romance genre with their alternating boy/girl perspectives; and this novel uses the same device to tell the story of childhood best friends pulled apart by tragedy and reunited by coincidence. Fred Roper is a technophile: "I'm into technology, it's a compulsion and a fear." He has a cool job as a marketing manager for an online company and a hot fiancée who has an "insatiable sexual appetite". But he's not really happy. Mickey Malony, his 70s best friend, hasn't seen him in 15 years. She's also living in London, runs her own flower shop and is bringing up her young son on her own. They meet by chance in a toy superstore, and the remainder of the book is a will they? won't they? get-it-together scenario against a backdrop of their shared memories from their small town past. The novel is nice, an old fashioned romance, but with a modern twist--techno boy rekindles lost love with the down to earth flower shop girl, even the language has a love in bloom quality to it: "her short curved lip turned tender and full". The Boy Next Door is an entertaining look at first love and the way it can all gone wrong and then go right. --Eithne Farry
Review
At the dawn of the 1980s Mickey and Fred are next door neighbours and best friends who are convinced that nothing will keep them apart. But that doesn't happen and 15 years later Mickey is beginning a new life whilst Fred is set to marry his girlfriend. Then he bumps into Mickey again for the first time since their worlds fell apart.Can they relive their glory days and overcome the devastating events that once tore them apart ?
--This text refers to an alternate
Paperback
edition.
She
‘A moving story of childhood friendship and grown-up love…you won’t want to put it down’
--This text refers to an alternate
Paperback
edition.
Book Description
INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLING AUTHORS OF WE ARE FAMILY
--This text refers to an alternate
Paperback
edition.
Product Description
Mickey Maloney and Fred Roper grew up together in a sleepy English village, and share everything. Fifteen years later, Mickey is beginning a new phase in her life as a single mum, when she bumps into Fred. He and his girlfriend are moving towards a new life also with their wedding just months away, but now ...
From the Publisher
The feel-good new bestseller from the authors of Come Together and Come Again
--This text refers to an alternate
Paperback
edition.
About the Author
Josie Lloyd and Emlyn Rees each had novels of their own published before teaming up to write the bestsellers Come Together, Come Again, The Boy Next Door, Love Lives and We are Family. They are married and live in London with their two daughters. (20010730)
--This text refers to an alternate
Paperback
edition.
Excerpted from The Boy Next Door by Josie Lloyd, Emlyn Rees. Copyright © 2002. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Chapter I
Fred
'Action,' Eddie calls from outside, and I step through the living-room doorway and out on to the sunlit roof terrace.
Despite being up here on the top floor of what's a four-storey building, there's not a breath of wind. I peer across the undulating cityscape of chimney pots and roof tiles and tower blocks. Shimmering in the distance, the slow-moving traffic snaking over the raised bulk of the Westway sounds strangely muffled, as if I'm observing it from behind a giant Perspex screen. My London: a city where you can be whoever you want to be, a city where thousands of lives are started and finished every day.
Careful not to look at Eddie (he's already told me twice not to), I sit down and face the lens of the camcorder he's holding. 'Hello,' I say, 'my name is Fred Wilson and I am -'
'Cut.'
This time I do look up at Eddie. Like me, he's perched on a white plastic garden chair and is stripped from the waist up. A thin band of shadow cast by a telephone wire rings the biceps of his left arm like a tattoo. He's a few years younger than me and his skin is slick with high-factor sun cream (Eddie doesn't do tans; they'd clash with his black leather jacket).
A gurgle of frustration rises to a growl at the back of my throat. This is the fifth cut I've sustained in as many minutes. Another, I fear, could well prove fatal.
'What now?' I explode, beginning to wish I'd refused his request to help him with this, his inaugural (and consequently slightly cringe-worthy) film-school project.
Eddie screws up his face, embarrassed and trying not to laugh. It's the kind of expression I've seen him use on girls in bars, the kind that melts away their defences and leaves them staring at him with helpless, adoring eyes.
His own eyes are a dark denim blue, although more often than not their wide-awake glory remains concealed behind his scrunched-up eyelids. This is a result of his refusal to wear his prescription glasses for anything other than watching television and this, in turn, is a result of his assumption that he's more attractive to women without them.
'Only if they're into squinty-looking weirdos,' I told him a few months ago, an accusation which (unsurprisingly, in hindsight) he was quick to deny.
And he was right to. Laid-back and sleazy works for Eddie. (Even Rebecca, my own beloved, has admitted as much.) His love life is spectacularly varied - particularly in comparison with my own - leading me to have wondered on several occasions whether it's my general lack of squintiness which has tethered me to a far more stable existence.
'I'm sorry,' he finally says. 'It's just . . .'
'Just what?' I demand as his words peter out and this latter-day Lou Reed pushes his dark hair back from his face. 'No, no,' I continue before he has time to speak. 'Let me guess. It's my fingernails, right?' I hold them up before my face. 'They're . . . too long?' I hazard. 'Or too grubby?' But Eddie shakes his head to both suggestions. 'Too naily?' I suggest.
He smiles, lopsided and knowing. 'Your nails are just fine.'
'What, then? Still my walk? My posture? My smile? The way I cross my legs?' His brow furrows awkwardly. 'Come on, Mister Scorsese,' I tell him, leaning back in my seat, 'give it to me straight. I can take it.'
Eddie sighs. 'You're being too stilted,' he says. 'It sounds like . . . like you're acting. And it's not meant to.'
This criticism comes as no surprise to me: I hate being scrutinised too closely, have done ever since I was a teenager. 'I warned you I'd be no good,' I say with a shrug.
'You're not . . . no good,' he tells me. 'You're . . .' But his words run out. 'It's just,' he tries again, 'that the words, "Hello, my name is Fred Wilson and I am . . ." . . . they're coming out all wrong.'
'Why?'
'Because people don't talk like that.'
'What people?'
'People like us.'
'People like us?'
'Yes. You know, real people . . . people on the street.'
'But we're on a roof terrace,' I point out.
'I was speaking metaphorically.'
'Ah.'
'Just try sounding a little bit less like you're reading the national news on the TV and a little bit more like yourself,' he advises. 'Like, ÒHi, my name's Fred Wilson and I'm . . ." Basically,' he continues, 'relax. It's only a dopey college assignment. No one outside my tutorial group's ever going to see it.'
'Relax?' I counter. 'That's easy enough for you to say. You went to acting school.'
'And my agent hasn't called me for six months,' he reminds me grimly.
Which is why he's working nights as a bar manager at a club called Nitrogene in King's Cross, I remind myself, and why getting something positive out of this film course is so important to him, and why, in turn, I agreed to help him out in the first place. 'OK,' I say. 'I'll give it one more try.'
He mumbles something about adjusting the camcorder's audio mix and I duck back into the living room, and lean idly up against the wall by the door and wait for my cue. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.
Fred
'Action,' Eddie calls from outside, and I step through the living-room doorway and out on to the sunlit roof terrace.
Despite being up here on the top floor of what's a four-storey building, there's not a breath of wind. I peer across the undulating cityscape of chimney pots and roof tiles and tower blocks. Shimmering in the distance, the slow-moving traffic snaking over the raised bulk of the Westway sounds strangely muffled, as if I'm observing it from behind a giant Perspex screen. My London: a city where you can be whoever you want to be, a city where thousands of lives are started and finished every day.
Careful not to look at Eddie (he's already told me twice not to), I sit down and face the lens of the camcorder he's holding. 'Hello,' I say, 'my name is Fred Wilson and I am -'
'Cut.'
This time I do look up at Eddie. Like me, he's perched on a white plastic garden chair and is stripped from the waist up. A thin band of shadow cast by a telephone wire rings the biceps of his left arm like a tattoo. He's a few years younger than me and his skin is slick with high-factor sun cream (Eddie doesn't do tans; they'd clash with his black leather jacket).
A gurgle of frustration rises to a growl at the back of my throat. This is the fifth cut I've sustained in as many minutes. Another, I fear, could well prove fatal.
'What now?' I explode, beginning to wish I'd refused his request to help him with this, his inaugural (and consequently slightly cringe-worthy) film-school project.
Eddie screws up his face, embarrassed and trying not to laugh. It's the kind of expression I've seen him use on girls in bars, the kind that melts away their defences and leaves them staring at him with helpless, adoring eyes.
His own eyes are a dark denim blue, although more often than not their wide-awake glory remains concealed behind his scrunched-up eyelids. This is a result of his refusal to wear his prescription glasses for anything other than watching television and this, in turn, is a result of his assumption that he's more attractive to women without them.
'Only if they're into squinty-looking weirdos,' I told him a few months ago, an accusation which (unsurprisingly, in hindsight) he was quick to deny.
And he was right to. Laid-back and sleazy works for Eddie. (Even Rebecca, my own beloved, has admitted as much.) His love life is spectacularly varied - particularly in comparison with my own - leading me to have wondered on several occasions whether it's my general lack of squintiness which has tethered me to a far more stable existence.
'I'm sorry,' he finally says. 'It's just . . .'
'Just what?' I demand as his words peter out and this latter-day Lou Reed pushes his dark hair back from his face. 'No, no,' I continue before he has time to speak. 'Let me guess. It's my fingernails, right?' I hold them up before my face. 'They're . . . too long?' I hazard. 'Or too grubby?' But Eddie shakes his head to both suggestions. 'Too naily?' I suggest.
He smiles, lopsided and knowing. 'Your nails are just fine.'
'What, then? Still my walk? My posture? My smile? The way I cross my legs?' His brow furrows awkwardly. 'Come on, Mister Scorsese,' I tell him, leaning back in my seat, 'give it to me straight. I can take it.'
Eddie sighs. 'You're being too stilted,' he says. 'It sounds like . . . like you're acting. And it's not meant to.'
This criticism comes as no surprise to me: I hate being scrutinised too closely, have done ever since I was a teenager. 'I warned you I'd be no good,' I say with a shrug.
'You're not . . . no good,' he tells me. 'You're . . .' But his words run out. 'It's just,' he tries again, 'that the words, "Hello, my name is Fred Wilson and I am . . ." . . . they're coming out all wrong.'
'Why?'
'Because people don't talk like that.'
'What people?'
'People like us.'
'People like us?'
'Yes. You know, real people . . . people on the street.'
'But we're on a roof terrace,' I point out.
'I was speaking metaphorically.'
'Ah.'
'Just try sounding a little bit less like you're reading the national news on the TV and a little bit more like yourself,' he advises. 'Like, ÒHi, my name's Fred Wilson and I'm . . ." Basically,' he continues, 'relax. It's only a dopey college assignment. No one outside my tutorial group's ever going to see it.'
'Relax?' I counter. 'That's easy enough for you to say. You went to acting school.'
'And my agent hasn't called me for six months,' he reminds me grimly.
Which is why he's working nights as a bar manager at a club called Nitrogene in King's Cross, I remind myself, and why getting something positive out of this film course is so important to him, and why, in turn, I agreed to help him out in the first place. 'OK,' I say. 'I'll give it one more try.'
He mumbles something about adjusting the camcorder's audio mix and I duck back into the living room, and lean idly up against the wall by the door and wait for my cue. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.
