Be Frank with me / Julia Claiborne Johnson.

Meet Frank - a modern nine-year-old boy with the wit of Noel Coward and the wardrobe of a 1930s movie star. Meet Mimi Banning - reclusive literary legend and mother to Frank. Mimi has been holed up in her Bel Air mansion for years, keeping her secrets, hiding from the world. Until Alice. Meet Alice - a level-headed young woman who finds herself thrust into the Banning household, charged with looking after Mimi's unusual son. Alice doesn't want mysteries, she doesn't want eccentricity and she certainly doesn't want a love-affair. But she finds all of them under the Banning roof. In so doing, she discovers a part of herself she never knew was missing. Full of heart and humour, Be Frank With Me is a captivating and unconventional story of an unusual mother and son, and the intrepid young woman who finds herself irresistibly pulled into their unforgettable world.