A gripping wartime drama from master storyteller and multi award-winner Robert Swindells. World War Two is raging, bombs rain down on Britain and brave young men fly their fighter planes against enormous odds. Gordon wishes he was one of them unlike his cowardly elder brother Raymond, who has done a runner. But finding Raymond leads Gordon to much more than he bargained for and into huge danger. Just what has his brother got him into?
It's the height of World War Two. Britain is being ravaged by bombs and most young men are off fighting. Gordon wishes he was too. Maybe then he wouldn't get bullied for having a cowardly family... Gordon's dad didn't serve in World War One, and now his older brother Raymond isn't serving in World War Two - he's gone missing. When Gordon finds a revolver hidden in his house, he tracks Raymond down, but ends up involved in more than he'd bargained for. Raymond enlists Gordon's help to deliver and collect some 'packages'. But is the work actually for the government? And will it have terrible consequences?
Robert E. "Bob" Swindells (born 20 March 1939) is an author of children's and young adult literature. Born in Bradford, the first of five children, Swindells worked for a local newspaper after leaving school aged 15. He served with the Royal Air Force and held various jobs before training as a teacher. His first novel, When Darkness Comes (1973), was written as his thesis while in training. Swindells combined writing with teaching until 1980 when he took up writing full-time. He first won the Children's Book Award with Brother in the Land (1985), a novel set in a post-apocalyptic world. Swindells was a supporter of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament and is quoted as saying that the work "... came out of my own anger and frustration ... you can't kill selectively with nuclear weapons, you wipe out millions of people ..." Swindells also won the award for Room 13 (1990), Nightmare Stairs (Short novel, 1998) and Blitzed (Younger readers, 2003). His young adult novel Stone Cold (1993), which dealt with homelessness, won the Carnegie Medal in 1994. Swindells is married, lives in Yorkshire and has two daughters and three grandchildren.
