I Think I Love You

From the no. 1 bestselling author of I Don't Know How She Does It: a witty and poignant story about a young girl who falls hopelessly in love with a teenage pin-up and some twenty years later, with her life in pieces all around her, finally gets to meet him.

Allison Pearson is one of the stars of her generation

If you had forgotten what it's like to be fourteen - or, indeed, are the parent of somebody who is - this is a novel not to be missed

Hilarious and beautiful...Funny, insightful, wonderful

Anyone who can make me laugh and cry in equal measure gets my vote

Pearson's knack for observing the ups and downs of ordinary folk (and all our faults and foibles) is pitch-perfect and as funny as it is poignant

Better written than anything by Nick Hornby ... this book is about big things - friendship, motherhood, love, loss - seen through the prism of smoke from a joss stick, set to jingly jangly music that still makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up, produces a shiver not unlike that from a Fox's glacier mint, and makes me almost, but not quite, want to wet my pants

It's a finely tuned and satisfying plot and the writing is flawless and funny ... But it is the book's subtle and profound examination of its central themes that really makes it shine

I Think I Love You is a precisely observed account of the obsessions of early adolescence, doing for the pop crush what Nick Hornby has done for football and vinyl

If you had forgotten what it's like to be 14 - or, indeed, are the parent of somebody who is - this is a novel not to be missed

Funny yet poignant story of obsession and first love

A satisfying celebration of love lost and found

The hugely affecting tale of a teen crush and its consequences decades later, this is a subtle and flawlessly written love story

Pearson's nostalgic narrative clearly marries the pangs of adolescence to mid-life regret. A pitch-perfect portrait of the teenage self.

Funny and poignant, it will also remind you why you'd never want to be 13 again!

Allison Pearson was born in South Wales. An award-winning journalist, she was named Newcomer of the Year at the British Book Awards for her first novel, I Don't Know How She Does It. Allison has written for many magazines and newspapers including the Independent on Sunday, Observer, the Sunday Times and the London Evening Standard. She is a contributing editor to Harper's Bazaar and, for four years, she was the popular Wednesday columnist of the Daily Mail. Allison is now a staff writer at the Daily Telegraph. She lives with her family in Cambridge.

1974. Thirteen-year-old Petra and her best friend Sharon are desperate to win a competition to meet their teen idol. 
 
Meanwhile Bill is unhappy in his job, ghostwriting the fanzine of the man so adored by the girls - and slightly unnerved by the extreme emotions of some of the fans. 
 
Fast forward to 1998. Petra is pushing forty and on the brink of divorce. While cleaning out her mother's wardrobe she finds a letter declaring her the winner of the competition she and Sharon had agonised over decades ago. 
 
So, twenty-four years after entering the competition the girls claim their prize and are flown out for an all-expenses-paid trip to Las Vegas to meet their hero at last. Bill, now the magazine's publisher, flies out with them... 
 
Poignant, hilarious, joyful, profoundly moving and uplifting, I Think I Love You captures what we learn about love, life and friendship through the universal experience of worshipping a teen dream. It will resonate with readers everywhere.

Allison Pearson

I love Kate Reddy...her tale made me cry twice and laugh often

Pearson writes with gratifying elegance and endearing self-mockery

It might be a sad indictment of the way things are today, but that doesn't stop Pearson making it funny

The kind of book you fall in love with - a grown-up novel that is hilarious, heartbreaking and brimming with the bitter-sweet tang of all our lives

Pearson...never hides her intelligence or apologises for her seriousness of purpose

A funny, heartbreaking mirror of the daily lives of mothers

If you could buy stock in a book, I would stake all my savings on the success of I Don't Know How She Does It. Here at last is the definitive social comedy of working motherhood

Here at last is the definitive social comedy of working motherhood

Funny, fast and full of nail-on-the-head observations

The writing is sharp, funny and cleverly observant of the small details - funny, intelligent and insightful

Pearson is a hilarious author who captures the guilt and the exhaustion of the working mother's life perfectly

It's the incisive details and Pearson's vivid writing that propel the story

Pearson is insightful, witty and full of fun

Her social observation is unerringly accurate...so beautifully written that it brought tears to my eyes, as well as a wry smile

Pearson...to write a novel...that has already sold a gazillion copies and is going to become a film. Hats off to you, madam!

Entertaining, compulsively readable, and brilliantly written

This terrific novel is alternately hilarious and sad

Pearson is a very witty and moving writer. Her prose is spare and skilful...waspish truisms and spot-on social observations

Intelligent, witty and of-the-moment, it mixes sassy, brittle perceptions with barefaced sentimentality

Brilliantly captures and defines the mood of the moment...sparkling wit and razor sharp insights

'A bible for the working mother' OPRAH WINFREY 
'It may change your life' OBSERVER 
'I can't think of a woman who wouldn't want this book' INDIA KNIGHT 
 
The twentieth anniversary edition of Allison Pearson's first novel that became a global sensation, now with a new introduction from the author. 
 
 Meet Kate Reddy, hedge-fund manager, wife and mother of two. Always time-poor, Kate must monitor nine currencies in five time zones but also keep in step with the Teletubbies. Factor in a manipulative nanny, piggish colleagues, a long-suffering husband, her quietly aghast in-laws, two needy children and an email lover, and you have a woman juggling so many things that some day something's going to hit the ground. And that something might just be Kate. 
 
 In an uproariously funny and achingly sad novel, Allison Pearson brilliantly dramatises the dilemma of working motherhood at the start of the twenty-first century. 
 
 'The definitive social comedy of working motherhood' WASHINGTON POST

I Don't Know How She Does It

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Allison Pearson

Praise for I Don't Know How She Does It

I love Kate Reddy...her tale made me cry twice and laugh often

Refreshingly engaging

Pearson writes with gratifying elegance and endearing self-mockery

I love Kate Reddy...her tale made me cry twice and laugh often

Refreshingly engaging

Pearson writes with gratifying elegance and endearing self-mockery

I love Kate Reddy...her tale made me cry twice and laugh often

Refreshingly engaging

Pearson writes with gratifying elegance and endearing self-mockery

Books by Allison Pearson

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