Strange Boy

by PaulMagrs (Author)

• Used

  Paperback
  2003

  $5.34

  Come back to 1980, to the North East of England, and meet David. Some might say he's a strange boy. David's an outsider. He's smart, sensitive - and convinced he has secret super-powers. Life for him and his brother is a constant whirl of would-be step-families and overbearing friends and relations. And even aged ten, he's finding he's not sure what he thinks about fancying girls when 14-year-old John down the road seems so much more interesting...Paul Magrs' warm, vividly told story of childhood's end blends comedy and drama in a wild play-ground of messed-up lives and family feuds.

• Used

  Paperback
  2002

  $3.25

  As the lurid excesses of the swirling 1970s give way to the neutral pastal shades of the early 1980s, David is ten years old but growing-up fast in a broken home in the north-east of England. Life for him and his brother is a constant whirl of interrogating parents, would-be step-families and over-bearing relatives. David lives with his mam, except at weekends when he sees his dad and his gran, who's always off impersonating Shirley Bassey down the working-men's clubs. The big women in his family talk to him like a grown-up, like he's one of the girls. They tell him he's bright, that he's sensitive, special. But such a strange boy...Afraid to trust his instincts and with his loyalties torn in two, David must face up to his childhood's end, his feuding family and his own burgeoning sexuality. And when everything around you is just take, take, take something's got to give...no matter who gets hurt in the process. Warm and funny, evocative and true, Paul Magrs' characters come so alive on the page you'll find yourself drawn into David's world with all defences down. It's a wild playground of messed-up lives and torn-up families and the strength of a secret, special love.