1980s British novel about working-class teens in love
I think the title was the names of the two characters, like “Frankie & Tina” (but not that.) (But “Tina” might be right.)
The novel was for adults, but it was about teenagers, and I read it as an American child in the early to mid 1980s. It was about two working-class teens coming of age who fall in love. It may have been an interracial romance, or possibly the girl on the cover just had darker skin in the drawing. I think they got married. They may have also had a baby. I think there was a lot of dialect or slang. It was a bit gritty and had vivid detail about their jobs and things like that, but it was pretty cheerful, not like a “kitchen sink” drama. It could have been an earlier book reprinted in the ’80s and I’m starting to think it could have been a British reprint of an Australian book. Basically starting to overthink everything. It is not the Kevin & Sadie series or Oscar & Lucinda.
The cover was a crayon-style drawing of the two characters. The way I remember it, it had a dark blue background on the cover and an orange spine. This makes me think Penguin (but not one the series that all have the same covers.) The cover art had very similar style to these covers:
Could this be Ivan Southall: Matt and Jo?
Thanks for your reply! I was just looking at this title on Goodreads the other day and wondering this. It doesn’t look right but I am going to try to get a copy anyway, just in case.
Thank you for your reply! I was just looking at this title on Goodreads the other day and wondering that. It doesn’t look right, but I am going to try to find a copy just in case. Thank you for your help!
Found! The Delinquents by Criena Rohan.
It was Australian, the copy I had was Penguin, the cover was just as I remembered but I was way off about the title and characters’ names. It’s really from the ’60s but my copy was published in ’86.