Rachel Billington's dramatic follow-up to Poppy's Hero features two opposing kinds of London kids, with Poppy straddling the gulf between them as she and her friends are drawn into a strange, unimaginable world.
Poppy's dad is still in prison. Her mum has rushed back to Poland to look after her seriously ill mother, and Poppy is sent to stay with her friend Jude. But Poppy feels stifled. At times like this she needs Angel, the joker among her friends - dodgy, wild, can't read or write much, yet bursting with energy and one of life's natural wits. But Angel, like Poppy, feels a bit orphaned, and has joined a gang. At half-term Poppy goes to stay with her friend Will in the country, and they write their second children's book. Poppy comes back to discover a note from Angel: At yor place. Need help. She finds him lying under the kitchen table, bleeding from an arm wound. Has he been stabbed? Why hasn't he rung 999? Who else is involved? And will her dad, now in an open prison, find out about her oddball friend? Rachel Billington's dramatic follow-up to Poppy's Hero features two opposing kinds of London kids, with Poppy straddling the gulf between them as she and her friends are drawn into a strange, unimaginable world.
Poppy's hero is Rachel Billington's fifth novel for children. She's also published twenty adult novels, the latest, The Missing Boy, about a thirteen year old who runs away from home. Rachel has been an editor and regular contributor to Inside Time, the national newspaper for prisoners, since it was founded over twenty years ago. Insights arising from her prison work emerges in this new childrens' novel. She has four children and five grandchildren, all keen readers. Rachel is married to the film and theatre director, Kevin Billington. They have four children, five grandchildren, and live in Notting Hill, London and near Sherborne, Dorset.
