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Authors: Jenny Colgan

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There were two of us here. But I didn't feel torn at all.

âFancy a little bit of hide and seek?' I winked at him.

âYes, miss!'

So we hid behind the tree. And he took me in his arms and I didn't object. And then I kissed him, and was kissed, properly. Like a grown-up. Without guidance and without restraint, just with sheer, perfect, fitting-together passion, without need for talking; without even a need to think. To paraphrase the Spice Girls, a band Stanzi didn't even remember: two became one.

Later, for sheer naughtiness, and because it's what teenagers do, we carved our initials on the tree. So they'll still be there
this year, when we go back. For a special occasion of our own. That I'm hoping is going to be just as special as Olly and Tashy's but in a very, very,
very
different way.

I think I'll stick to profiteroles.

By the same author:

Amanda's Wedding
Talking to Addison
Looking for Andrew McCarthy
Working Wonders

Acclaim for
Working Wonders:

âFunny, magical and moving, this is a rewarding read.'

Time Out

âWe laughed a lot.'

Heat

âA delicious comedy. Will melt even the hardest of hearts.'

Red

âColgan's witty book perfectly captures the frustrations and petty vexations of office life.'

She

âHugely entertaining and very funny.'

Cosmopolitan

âA funny, clever page-turner.'

Closer

âFans of
The Office
will love this witty tale.'

Woman's Own

âA quirky tale of love, work and the meaning of life.'

Company

âIf you think David Brent causes mayhem in
The Office
wait till you see what town-planner Arthur and his team get up to in Jenny Colgan's comic romp.'

In Style

Looking for Andrew McCarthy
:

âColgan is on top form in this, her latest outrageous romp.'

Cosmopolitan

âJenny Colgan is one of the leaders of the pack and this, her third novel, will delight her legions of admirers. Fast-paced, funny, poignant and well-observed it reads as a pastiche of the movies she loved â¦ If a time capsule were buried to capture the world at the turn of the 21st century, this would be a candidate for inclusion: her sense of time and place are that authentic.'

Daily Mail

âLooking for Andrew McCarthy
will strike a chord with anyone who did their growing up in the 80s. Wonderful, warm and resonant for anyone who ever wondered what happened to teenage dreams.'

Hello

âThat's Life
meets
This Life,
with
Once in a Lifetime
thrown in, all talking heads, witty one-liners and angst-ridden relationships â¦ Did I like this book? Well, d'uh! Do hedgehogs have quills? A pure belter of a novel.'

Glasgow Herald

âColgan's enjoyable new bestseller investigates the notion that having it all can sometimes mean having precisely nothing at all.'

Marie Claire

âColgan's
Looking for Andrew McCarthy
is sharp, well-observed and hilarious.'

New Statesman

âColgan's got an ear for sarky dialogue and a humour that gives her more options â¦ retro-irony, perfect for a conscientious objector's beach holiday.'

âJenny Colgan delivers the goods with her new novel â¦ absolutely brilliant! What really sets Jenny apart from most of her contemporaries is this: she is very, very funny, so much so that this book had me laughing out loud.'

Express

âThere's razor-sharp wit to this tale of romantic confusion.'

Cosmopolitan

Amanda's Wedding:

âAmanda's Wedding
is a scream.'

Elle

âFour Weddings and a Funeral
meets
Friends.'

Tatler

âCompulsively comical.'

Cosmopolitan

âFunny and insightful.'

Mail on Sunday

Jenny Colgan was born in 1972 in Ayrshire. After Edinburgh University, she worked for six years in the health service, moonlighting as a cartoonist and stand-up comic. She is the author of four previous bestselling novels:
Amanda's Wedding, Talking to Addison, Looking for Andrew McCarthy
and
Working Wonders
, all of which are in development for film and TV. Jenny is married, lives in London and is working on her sixth novel. For more information, visit her website at
www.jennycolgan.com
.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters, and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

THE BOY I LOVED BEFORE. Copyright Â© 2004 by Jenny Colgan. All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address St. Martin's Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

www.stmartins.com

First published in Great Britain under the title
Do You Remember the First Time?
by HarperCollins
Publishers

eISBN 9781466819429

First eBook Edition : April 2012

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

ISBN 0-312-33198-3

EAN 978-0312-33198-6