Secret Scribbled Notebooks

Author(s): Joanne Horniman

Fiction - YA

Kate writes all her dreams and hidden thoughts in her secret scribbled notebooks as she helps to care for her sister's baby, makes friends with Alex, thinks about her lost parents, and yearns for the future. A beautifully written portait of a young girl in her last year of school.

'My name is Kate O'Farrell and I am seventeen years old. I am in my last year of school, and when that is over I will be leaving this place for good - going to a real city, where I will begin my new life.

I have long red hair and pale skin. I like staying up very late at night. It is my ambition to see the sun rise, but sadly I am always asleep by then. I love eating and reading, preferably at the same time.

I am very tall, and too thin.

I have never been in love.'



Kate has three notebooks, the Red, Yellow and Blue Notebooks, in which she records her life. Through reading and writing, living and learning to love, she discovers things about herself that she never expected. The companion to My Candlelight Novel.


Product Information

a deeply satisfying novel on every level understated and beautifully written a writer of rare skill and power.' ViewpointSpring 2004.The writing is beautiful brightened by shafts of humour romantic and introspective.' MagpiesVol 19, No 4, Sept 2004Kate's emotions, her thoughts and her honesty are transfixing. Horniman captures the anxiety and possibility of the cusp of adulthood, using elegant, evocative prose.' Weekend Australian, December 2004A languid, romantic, charming novel 'ACYL Newsletter, Dec. 2004An evocative, dream-like read.' Girlfriendmagazine

Joanne Horniman has spent most of her life in New South Wales, apart from a few years in Sydney and some time travelling overseas. She has worked as an editor, teacher and artist -- some of the posters she helped produce are in the Australian National Gallery. She lives outside Lismore in a house and workshop she and her partner built themselves, and has two sons. Everyone in the family plays music apart from Joanne, and she says 'the rural peace is sometimes shattered by teenage boys jamming in the workshop'. As well as writing and reading she likes to propagate rainforest trees, practise yoga, grow vegetables and walk along the beach.

General Fields

  • : 9781741144062
  • : Allen & Unwin
  • : Allen & Unwin
  • : 0.224
  • : September 2004
  • : 196mm X 133mm X 18mm
  • : Australia
  • : books

Special Fields

  • : Joanne Horniman
  • : Paperback
  • : A823.3
  • : From 14 To 99
  • : 228
  • : YFB