Dear Nobody

Set in the northern English city of Sheffield, Dear Nobody (1991), English author Berlie Doherty’s realistic young-adult novel, follows the unexpected teenage pregnancy of Helen Garton and her boyfriend, Chris Marshall, and the lasting consequences it has on both of their families. Divided into two points of view, the story shifts back and forth between Chris’s first-person perspective as he recounts the pregnancy in retrospect, and a succession of letters written by Helen to their unborn baby, Nobody. The story begins in autumn, with each chapter named after a month of the year. Dear Nobody won the 1991 Carnegie Medal for Best Children’s Book, as well as the Japanese Sankei Children’s Book Award in 1994. The novel has been praised for being “wise, lyrical, and graced with insight and intelligence” by Kirkus Reviews and “complex, and often unwieldy” by Publishers Weekly. According to School Library Journal, it features “some of the loveliest, most lyrical prose to be found in YA fiction.” Dear Nobody has been adapted as a stage play, a made-for-television film, and a BBC radio play.

The novel begins during the autumn in Sheffield, north England. Seventeen-year-old Christopher Marshall, a high-school senior, recalls his relationship with girlfriend, Helen Garton (aka Nell), who is the same age and in the same grade. Chris and Helen made love for the first and only time, and he is afraid Helen may be pregnant. Still, he is in love with Helen. Chris lives with his father, Alan, an amateur potter, and younger brother, Guy. His mother, Joan, is a professional photographer who left the family years ago to live with her rock-climbing partner, Don. After Chris has sex with Helen, he asks his father about his dissolved marriage and decides to contact his mother. Chris plans to study English at Newcastle University, while Helen plans to attend a music university in Manchester. Just as Chris is set to leave for college in the fall, he receives a parcel of letters. Chris recognizes the handwriting as Helen’s and begins reading the letters, which remind him of the past nine months of her pregnancy. Each letter is named after a month of the year, beginning with January.

At the end of February, Helen takes a pregnancy test that shows up negative. When she takes another test that proves negative, Helen cannot decide what to do about her pregnancy. She lives with her strict banker mother, Alice, her father, Ted, a jazz musician and university librarian, younger brother, Robbie, Granddad, Alice’s father, and Nan, Alice’s mother. As soon as Helen believes she may be pregnant, she begins writing letters to her nameless unborn baby. Each letter begins Dear Nobody and proceeds to chronicle the difficult choices she makes throughout her dilemma. In her first letter, Helen writes, “You're only a whisper...leave me alone. Go away. Go away. Please, please, go away." Helen becomes increasingly distant from Chris, severing all ties with him so he can attend college, and she can deal with the pregnancy alone. Chris stands by Helen’s decision no matter what. Afraid of ruining her chances of attending university, Helen attempts to induce a miscarriage by riding a horse that she forces into a herky-jerky gallop.



In April, Alice finds out that Helen is pregnant. Alice urges Helen to either have an abortion or put the baby up for adoption. Ted agrees that Helen cannot keep the baby at such a premature age, while the other family members encourage Helen to keep the baby. Even so, Alice takes Helen to an abortion clinic in the springtime. However, Helen walks out of the clinic, secretly deciding to keep the child and raise it herself. Irate, Alice forbids Chris from entering the Garton household, but Helen continues to see Chris from time to time in private. Later, Helen and Chris visit his mother, Joan, in Carlisle. Chris learns that his mother abandoned her family for reasons that are far less selfish than he initially thought.
In late June, Helen and Chris take their A-Levels exams for university. Once finished, Helen tells Chris that she thinks they should end their relationship, believing it is best for both parties. Chris feels sad and regretful. To forget his sorrow, Chris travels to France with his best friend, Tom. While in France, Chris meets Bryn, a Welsh girl who is attracted to him. Despite growing close with Bryn, Chris cannot forget or replace Helen.

In September, Helen learns why her mother has been so negative towards the pregnancy all along. It becomes known that Alice was an illegitimate child born out of wedlock in a time of severe judgment and is scarred from the stigma. After hearing her mother’s story, Helen begins to understand Alice better. When Helen’s labor contractions begin on September 30, she has the urge to send the bundle of “Dear Nobody” letters to Chris. Helen has Robbie deliver the letters. Chris receives the letters addressed to “Nobody” and feels sad that Helen thinks he has become nobody to her over the past nine months. However, when Chris reads the letters, he realizes the baby is on its way. Chris rushes to the hospital to be with Helen and their newborn just in time. When Chris arrives at the hospital, he meets their newborn daughter, whom Helen has named Amy.

In addition to Dear Nobody, Doherty has written several dozen books for children and young adults. She is most known for her novels White Peak Farm, Children of Winter, Granny Was a Buffer Girl (which also won the Carnegie Award), Street Child, The Snake Stone, The Snow Queen, and many more. Doherty has also written dozens of picture books, storybooks, and short story collections, as well as a handful of poetry collections.