Featured on The Book Show on Sky Arts on 24 November 2011.
If the first page doesn’t make you want to read on then this isn’t the book for you. It’s violent and to the point – it’s psychological suspense at its best and provides a window into a school where respect for others doesn’t appear to exist but why? Jackson is determined to find out and investigating a teacher’s death might just do it.
'The playful, obstinate and courageously humorous tone of Zephaniah's writing shines through ... hilarious and later heartbreaking'Guardian
A teacher is dead, murdered by two of his students in front of the whole school.
Right in front of Jackson Jones.
But Mr Joseph was a good man - people liked him, respected him. How could those boys stab him and jog away like nothing had happened?
Unable to process what he has seen, Jackson begins his own investigation: everyone knows who did it, but as Jackson uncovers more about the boys, he becomes convinced that people need to understand why.
Brilliantly written and with a real ear for dialogue, fans of Angie Thomas and Malorie Blackman will love Benjamin Zephaniah's novels for young adult readers:
Poet, novelist and playwright Benjamin Zephaniah was born on 15 April 1958. He grew up in Jamaica and the Handsworth district of Birmingham, England, leaving school at 14. He moved to London in 1979 and published his first poetry collection, Pen Rhythm, in 1980.
He has been Writer in Residence at the Africa Arts Collective in Liverpool and Creative Artist in Residence at Cambridge University, and was a candidate for the post of Professor of Poetry at Oxford University. He holds an honorary doctorate in Arts and Humanities from the University of North London (1998), was made a Doctor of Letters by the University of Central England (1999)
