Pigeon English by Stephen Kelman
Oct. 18th, 2011 10:41 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
quippeThe Blurb On The Back:
Everybody says there’s a war but I haven’t seen it yet.
There’s a hell of wars going on all the time:
Wars
Kids vs Teachers, Northwell Manor High vs Leabridge High, Dell Farm Crew vs Lewsey Hill Crew, Emos vs Sunshine, Turkey vs Russia, Arsenal vs Chelsea, Black vs White, Police vs Kids, God vs Allah, Chicken Joe’s vs KFC, Cats vs Dogs, Aliens vs Predators.
I haven’t seen any of them. You’d know if there was a war because all the windows would be broken and the helicopters would have guns on them. The helicopters don’t even have guns, just torchlights. I don’t even think there’s a war. I haven’t seen it.
I don’t even know what side I’m on. Nobody’s told me yet.
Vs just means against.
Newly arrived from Ghana with his mother and older sister, eleven-year-old Harrison Opoku lives on the ninth floor of a block of flats on an inner-city housing estate. The second best runner in the whole of Year 7, Harri races through his new life in his personalised trainers – the Adidas stripes drawn on with marker pen blissfully unaware of the very real threat all around him.
With equal fascination for the local gang – the Dell Farm Crew – and for the pigeon who visits his balcony, Harri absorbs the many strange elements of life in England: watching, listening and learning the tricks of urban survival.
But when a boy is knifed to death on the high street and a police appeal for witnesses draws only silence, Harri decides to start a murder investigation of his own. In doing so, he unwittingly endangers the fragile web his mother has spun around her family to try to keep them safe.
A story of innocence and experience, hope and harsh reality, Pigeon English is a spellbinding portrayal of a boy balancing on the edge of manhood and of the forces around him that try to shape the way he falls.
Eleven-year-old Harri lives on an inner-city council estate with his mother and his sister. When a teenage boy who Harri vaguely knew, is stabbed to death, Harri is surprised that no one seems to know who did it and decides to investigate it himself with his friend, Dean. But Harri is an innocent in a cruel place. Although he sees the gangs and crime that are endemic on the estate, he doesn’t really understand them – just as he doesn’t understand that his ‘uncle’ Julius is a people trafficker, money lender and petty thug. For Harri, everything is a game, but when his ‘investigations’ bring him to the attention of the Dell Farm Crew and particularly Killa and X-Fire, he discovers a world of reality that he isn’t prepared for …
Inspired by the murder of Damilola Taylor, Stephen Kelman’s debut novel is an almost pitch perfect examination of innocence and reality in the crime-ridden inner city.
By giving Harri a convincing first person voice, Kelman successfully shows the innocence of the boy and how the reality of his world largely escapes him. What works especially well is the slang that peppers his narration, which feels natural and convincing and is used in such a way that it remains easy to follow what’s going on.
Although it’s a dark novel, it isn’t bleak. The romance that develops between Harri and Poppi is sweetly depicted and there’s a lot of warmth in Harri’s home life – from his hard-working mum, the bickering with his older sister Lydia and his phone calls to his dad and baby sister in Ghana. However when the dark scenes come, they are genuinely chilling – most notably a scene where Lydia’s friend Miquita is ironing her hair, which turns from teenage fun into something more sinister in a couple of sentences.
However, while I really enjoyed this novel and feel that it deserves its place on the 2011 Booker shortlist, for me the only bum note comes in scenes narrated by a pigeon who’s been befriended by Harri. For me, it was too much of a self-conscious literary device, which detracted both from Harri’s story and the credibility of his narration.
This is a touching, chilling, funny and desperately sad novel that kept me turning the pages, hoping that it wouldn’t end. I can’t wait to see what Stephen Kelman writes next.
The Verdict:
Stephen Kelman’s debut novel is a touching, chilling, funny and desperately sad story of an innocent young boy in a brutal world. Although the sections narrated by a pigeon was too much of a literary device to work for me, it didn’t detract from my enjoyment of the novel and I think it deserves its place on the 2011 Booker short list.
Thanks to the Amazon Vine Programme for the free copy of this book.
There’s a hell of wars going on all the time:
Wars
Kids vs Teachers, Northwell Manor High vs Leabridge High, Dell Farm Crew vs Lewsey Hill Crew, Emos vs Sunshine, Turkey vs Russia, Arsenal vs Chelsea, Black vs White, Police vs Kids, God vs Allah, Chicken Joe’s vs KFC, Cats vs Dogs, Aliens vs Predators.
I haven’t seen any of them. You’d know if there was a war because all the windows would be broken and the helicopters would have guns on them. The helicopters don’t even have guns, just torchlights. I don’t even think there’s a war. I haven’t seen it.
I don’t even know what side I’m on. Nobody’s told me yet.
Vs just means against.
Newly arrived from Ghana with his mother and older sister, eleven-year-old Harrison Opoku lives on the ninth floor of a block of flats on an inner-city housing estate. The second best runner in the whole of Year 7, Harri races through his new life in his personalised trainers – the Adidas stripes drawn on with marker pen blissfully unaware of the very real threat all around him.
With equal fascination for the local gang – the Dell Farm Crew – and for the pigeon who visits his balcony, Harri absorbs the many strange elements of life in England: watching, listening and learning the tricks of urban survival.
But when a boy is knifed to death on the high street and a police appeal for witnesses draws only silence, Harri decides to start a murder investigation of his own. In doing so, he unwittingly endangers the fragile web his mother has spun around her family to try to keep them safe.
A story of innocence and experience, hope and harsh reality, Pigeon English is a spellbinding portrayal of a boy balancing on the edge of manhood and of the forces around him that try to shape the way he falls.
Eleven-year-old Harri lives on an inner-city council estate with his mother and his sister. When a teenage boy who Harri vaguely knew, is stabbed to death, Harri is surprised that no one seems to know who did it and decides to investigate it himself with his friend, Dean. But Harri is an innocent in a cruel place. Although he sees the gangs and crime that are endemic on the estate, he doesn’t really understand them – just as he doesn’t understand that his ‘uncle’ Julius is a people trafficker, money lender and petty thug. For Harri, everything is a game, but when his ‘investigations’ bring him to the attention of the Dell Farm Crew and particularly Killa and X-Fire, he discovers a world of reality that he isn’t prepared for …
Inspired by the murder of Damilola Taylor, Stephen Kelman’s debut novel is an almost pitch perfect examination of innocence and reality in the crime-ridden inner city.
By giving Harri a convincing first person voice, Kelman successfully shows the innocence of the boy and how the reality of his world largely escapes him. What works especially well is the slang that peppers his narration, which feels natural and convincing and is used in such a way that it remains easy to follow what’s going on.
Although it’s a dark novel, it isn’t bleak. The romance that develops between Harri and Poppi is sweetly depicted and there’s a lot of warmth in Harri’s home life – from his hard-working mum, the bickering with his older sister Lydia and his phone calls to his dad and baby sister in Ghana. However when the dark scenes come, they are genuinely chilling – most notably a scene where Lydia’s friend Miquita is ironing her hair, which turns from teenage fun into something more sinister in a couple of sentences.
However, while I really enjoyed this novel and feel that it deserves its place on the 2011 Booker shortlist, for me the only bum note comes in scenes narrated by a pigeon who’s been befriended by Harri. For me, it was too much of a self-conscious literary device, which detracted both from Harri’s story and the credibility of his narration.
This is a touching, chilling, funny and desperately sad novel that kept me turning the pages, hoping that it wouldn’t end. I can’t wait to see what Stephen Kelman writes next.
The Verdict:
Stephen Kelman’s debut novel is a touching, chilling, funny and desperately sad story of an innocent young boy in a brutal world. Although the sections narrated by a pigeon was too much of a literary device to work for me, it didn’t detract from my enjoyment of the novel and I think it deserves its place on the 2011 Booker short list.
Thanks to the Amazon Vine Programme for the free copy of this book.
