THE Ancient Greeks represented human experience in the twin masks of tragedy and comedy, but you might argue a magazine’s problem page is just as effective. The BBC recently broadcast a social history of the agony aunt which highlighted problem pages’ strange melding of giggles and misery. There were laughs at the more absurd letters, but sadness too: people write to a magazine because they have no-one else in whom to confide.

This novel seizes upon the tragi-comic aspect of problem pages, mocking the ridiculous tips they offer, while showing the risky extremes to which their advice can push a vulnerable girl.

Katy Clemmy is 15, uneasy in her blossoming body, embarrassed by “the sudden acquisition of an appearance which was at variance with the little girl within”. There is no best friend to talk to, and her mother, Corinne, has been removed to a rehab clinic. Her teacher, Miss Ellingham, could offer counsel were she not soured by life in their dismal Ayrshire secondary school. So Katy seeks guidance from the teenage magazine, Misty.

Each of these women perceives herself as failing. They are not living up to the female ideals promoted by society, and magazines such as Misty. Katy feels her body shape is wrong. Corinne has failed as a wife and mother, Miss Ellingham is ageing and has no prospect of marriage. The narratives of these characters are interwoven, revealing women blaming themselves for not meeting unattainable standards.

The book begins as an epistolary novel, with letters between Katy and the Misty agony aunt, but those anticipating a tome with the clout of Clarissa will be disappointed. It slips into light comedy, with Misty administering advice such as “put down that bowl of Frosties and start running” or likening a celebrity to “a banana caught in a fishing net”.

The author often adopts a humorous tone, particularly in describing Miss Ellingham’s pupils. The teenage boys are “steaming animals” with “spots glowing” while others have “missed the point of evolution”. But the humour is often undone by pinning the observations to clichéd classroom high jinks. These boys ping bra straps, lob paper aeroplanes, and so the scenes wilt from satire to a Bash Street Kids comic strip.

But just as the novel threatens to dwindle into thin comedy, we’re pulled into bleakness. Corinne’s segments are narrated from a locked ward and she gradually reveals the trauma which pushed her into alcoholism. Seeking oblivion, she says: “I indulged my heart too much. I grew to hate its moaning ... God, the release from having no heart.”

Corinne’s sections are the strongest, yet they stand oddly apart from the rest of the novel. This reflects her literal isolation on the ward, but as her story rarely merges with the linked fortunes of Katy and Miss Ellingham, it creates the effect of a supplementary narrative bolted onto the story.

Unfortunately, those linked fortunes are rather implausible. Katy runs away to London for cosmetic surgery and we must accept that the timid schoolgirl suddenly acquires the nerve to leave home. Neither is it explained how the child is able to afford the services of a private London surgeon. Stranger still is the fact that Miss Ellingham sets off to rescue her. Katy’s father doesn’t exert himself, and neither do the police. It falls to the English teacher, who admits “she hardly knew the girl at all”, and yet “Katy is all that matters now”.

We could overlook the teetering plot if the characters were sturdy, but the author deliberately obscures them. Katy feels ugly, but others describe her as “an Alpine flower”.

Meanwhile, Miss Ellingham tells us she feels “clipped, spinsterly and bitter” but to others she’s “that pretty redhead”.

So we can’t trust our perception of the characters. One assumes this is a literary trick to show that appearance shouldn’t matter, but Katy’s appearance matters hugely as that is what the plot turns on. Likewise with Miss Ellingham: is she indeed relatively young and sexually attractive? That matters too, because the thing she wants most is marriage and children. The point is made that appearance is of no consequence but the plot demands that it is.

The author’s cause is noble, and delivered with humour, but the fact that women shouldn’t be judged on appearance is a lesson for the novel’s cruel male characters, not the readers.

Beauty Tips for Girls by Margaret Montgomery, from Cargo Publishing, £8.99