an extraordinary account of acting as a life force
The 'Freddies' of the title is a stage school, and Freddie herself a formidable character who runs the ramshackle edifice, where some pupils have no proper home or family and scavenge in the Old Covent garden market for their food. But the book is really a study of what it is to be an actor to the core, even if you are only nine or 12 years old. The writing is wonderful and the content profound and disturbing - and funny too.