Robi's Flying Saucer Drive-In

A review

Reading a book about an adolescent or teenager does not mean it is a book for young adults. Why are there so little novels with young people as the main character? Why is it that almost always we are invited to enter the inner world of adults, to follow their adventures?

In fact it is the world of young people that shows how strange and wonderful life itself is! They are unhindered by the strict rules of grown ups. Yes, they have their rules too, but they are a bit wonky, idiosyncratic, sometimes outrageous or silly. Still they form the moral and social compasses that they live by in those years. They remind us who we were once, how unstable and exciting life was, how full of promises, failures and disappointments. And so is the world of our protagonist Saffron, a fourteen year old girl living in Antoninio.

In fact Saffron is quite a normal girl, but her name evokes a promise, a peculiarity, an instant sympathy. She is smart, funny and whimsical. As a reader I laughed out loud even.

When I worked at Robi’s I must have had the metabolism of a rabbit—a skinny rabbit, not one of those overfed ones—because I ate a lot of fried foods and never topped one hundred and twenty pounds. Maybe it was all that running around. It could have just been hormones.

Her life is not very adventurous, but one day her parents buy a diner. She starts working there to save money. For she has a dream. There is this new and enigmatic girl Clair in her class. Clair could be seen as the personalization of what life may have in store for Saffron. Maybe.

The book invites you to see life as it is. There is something of Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye in it, or The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13 ¾ by British author Sue Townsend.

Winsa's novel has its own sphere and language, as girls bring a different 'atmosphere', different codes and words.

Margriet Kemper, artist and writer

The Netherlands, June 2022