Author(s): Joanna Horton

Aust Fiction

Between You and Me is a riveting portrayal of female friendship, and the frayed boundary between loyalty and desire.

Mari and Elisabeth have been at the centre of each other’s lives for years. Close friends since university, they’re now drifting through their mid-twenties, working casual jobs and living in run-down share houses.

When they meet Jack, a charming academic historian twenty years their senior, they’re attracted to the sophisticated, intellectual world in which he seems to move. As the summer gathers heat, Jack is drawn into their lives, and an unconventional relationship – halfway between friendship and love triangle – develops.

But soon things grow more complicated, and as secrets and betrayals detonate, the fallout sets the course for the rest of their lives.   

In Mari and Elisabeth, Joanna Horton has created two unforgettable women, whose choices on the cusp of adulthood will resonate with anyone who has ever had to navigate where friendship, intimacy and love intersect when trying to make a life of one’s own. 

MATILDA BOOKSHOP REVIEW

In this stellar Australian debut, recent uni grads and best friends Elisabeth and Mari meet an academic, Jack, who is double their age. Self-exploration and the betrayals which come with it are the name of the game as their trio tightens and power dynamics shift tectonically. As the characters themselves wonder, are they bad people? Or are they just human? Natasha Scholl’s description of this book as unsettling and captivating couldn’t be more spot on. Written in tight, evocative prose, I recommend this for fans of Diana Reid or Sally Rooney especially. Marina