"Pigeon English is a triumph." -- Emma Donoghue, author of Room
Shortlisted for the 2011 Man Booker Prize and the 2011 Guardian First Book Award
Eleven-year-old Harrison Opoku is the second best runner in the whole of Year 7. Harri races through his new life in England in his Adidas trainers - blissfully unaware of the threats around him. With equal fascination for the local gang - the Dell Farm Crew - and the pigeon who visits his balcony, Harri absorbs the many strange elements of his new home: watching, listening, and learning the tricks of inner-city survival. But when a boy is knifed to death, Harri starts a murder investigation of his own and endangers the fragile web his mother has spun around her family to keep them safe.
A story of innocence and experience, hope and harsh reality, Pigeon English is a superb portrayal of a boy balancing on the edge of manhood and of the forces around him that try to shape who he becomes.
A violent and riveting coming of age story, Stephen Kelman's debut novel also contains well-timed moments of comedy, affecting family drama, and just enough hopefulness to dilute the setting's biting flavour of despair.
. . . engaging . . . Kelman's dead-on evocation of the horrors and freedoms of an inner-city childhood deserves attention.
. . . a tour de force . . . Funny and poignant, Pigeon English is fired with an uncontainable spirit, a rare distillate of boyhood optimism and adult wisdom.
... a topical novel with a great narrative voice ... the ending will crush you.
Kelman has created an endearing character at once foreign yet familiar . . . Pigeon English is a mesmerizing tale of naïveté and discovery that has us rooting on the sidelines, hoping that Harri will triumph.
[Stephen Kelman] took a real-life knife murder of an immigrant boy a decade ago as his starting point, but the youth he created is distinctly and wonderfully his own.
Kelman blends Ghanaian slang such as "Asweh" ("I swear") and "hutious" ("frightening") with familiar London-ese to fresher and funnier effect. [. . .] Pigeon English does an admirable job of revealing the frightened teenage boys behind gang members' tough facades.
Kelman has crafted a book that soars.
Filled with energy, humour and compassion, Pigeon English is a gut-wrenchingly sad novel that makes you laugh out loud.
Most novels aren’t as imaginative, gut-wrenching and powerful as Pigeon English by Stephen Kelman, and this one is Kelman’s first. It’s immediately engaging, and it doesn’t let go. [. . .] Pigeon English is an amazing novel. It’s a window on a world many of us will never experience (thankfully), and it is beautifully and intelligently written.
. . . an authentic and audacious first novel . . . It will be a while before the buzz about [Kelman] dies down.
. . . a very impressive debut . . .
. . . exceptional . . . Opoku’s plight is both heart-warming and heartbreaking.
. . . something of a phenomenon . . .
. . . riveting . . .
. . . chilling and charming . . . [Pigeon English is] a coming-of-age tale that feels achingly accurate.
Pigeon English convincingly evokes life on the edge as lived by many British children today; the humour, the resilience, the sheer ebullience of its narrator -- a hero for our times -- should ensure the book becomes, deservedly, a classic.
Harrison Opoku, the 11-year-old Ghanaian boy who is the narrator of this very fine coming-of-age novel, may well be about to take his place among other well-loved children in literature. [. . .] To be moved to care this deeply for a fictional character is a rare experience.
Told with humour, despite the gritty subject matter and setting...Pigeon English charms its way into some hard places...
Stephen Kelman’s [first novel] has a powerful story, a pacy plot and engaging characters. It paints a vivid portrait with honesty, sympathy and wit, of a much neglected milieu, and it addresses urgent social questions. It is horrifying, tender and funny. [. . .] Pigeon English will be read by millions.
Few writers nail a voice as well as Stephen Kelman does ...