A gang of girls ready to fight for their turf and their future

KELLY Frost is on the cusp of something big, probably bigger than big. Until the end of last year a trainee reporter in the JEP and Bailiwick Express newsroom, the 25-year-old is about to embark on a life-changing journey that she has been planning, more or less, since the age of 15.

Standing on a platform so full of promise, she seems caught between wanting to scream with excitement, sharing it with everyone, and playing it down, worried that any exuberance might appear boastful. You have to hope that she hangs on to this grounding in the years ahead, and everything suggests that she will because her journey is, in part, a self-aware exploration of truth, honesty and authenticity – a timeless literary quest for the essence of humanity.

On Thursday, Kelly’s debut novel, The Kings Head, was launched in a book shop in London’s Finsbury Park, close to the pub where she discovered the gang of girls who have changed her life (…although, pub or no pub, you get the impression nothing was going to stop that stubbornly determined 15-year-old getting on her train). On Sunday, it was named as Book of the Month in the Sunday Times – that’s like John Peel putting your debut single at No 1 on his radio-show playlist (…for those old enough to remember)…