Toffee

Toffee follows Allison, a teenage girl who takes refuge with an older woman named Marla. Because Marla has dementia, she does not recognise Allison as a stranger but instead believes her to be an old friend called Toffee. Allison gradually adopts this identity, becoming the person Marla knows and trusts, though their relationship is also marked by moments of fear and conflict. The novel is written in verse, a format Crossan has used in several of her previous works.

The narrative uses the relationship between Allison and Marla to explore questions of identity, belonging, and the meaning of home and family. Allison's assumption of a false identity raises implicit questions about selfhood and how individuals define themselves in relation to others. The backdrop of dementia introduces the theme of memory and its role in personal and relational continuity. These concerns are framed within a domestic and intergenerational setting rather than a fantastical or action-driven one.

Sarah Crossan is an Irish author whose previous novels include The Weight of Water, Apple and Rain, and One. One won the CILIP Carnegie Medal, the CBI Book of the Year, the YA Book Prize, and the CLiPPA Poetry Award in 2016, and its translations received further recognition in the Netherlands and Germany. Crossan also co-authored We Come Apart with Brian Conaghan. She has held the role of Laureate na nÓg, the Irish children's literature laureate.

Toffee is a novel written in verse, consistent with Crossan's established approach in titles such as One. It is published as a young adult title and centres on a teenage protagonist navigating questions of identity and circumstance. The verse format condenses the narrative into a lyric structure rather than conventional prose chapters. Readers familiar with Crossan's earlier work will find the form recognisable, while the subject matter of dementia and youth homelessness situates the book within contemporary realistic fiction for older teen audiences.