During the party, Tobey has sex with a woman named Misty, who becomes pregnant and gives birth to Tobey's daughter Libby. He attempts to have a relationship with her for their child's sake, but it falls apart. As I am, and always will be a Nought, how the hell can I compare it to being anything else… I really couldn’t remember any Cross political candidate being asked how it felt to be a Cross doing the same job… That was just taken as the default position. It was as if the rest of us who were WAME – white and mixed-ethnic – were aberrations… Crosses were one group and everyone else got lumped into the WAME category like we were all one, big, homogenous mass and not worthy of distinct categorization.” Peacemaker" in the multi-author collection Peacemaker and Other Stories (illustrated by Peter Richardson and David Hine), Heinemann Educational, 1999, ISBN 0-435-11600-2 The two are then surprised by the rest of the gang, and Jude and Callum point their guns at each other; Sephy takes advantage of the confusion to flee. The story ends with Callum and Jude shooting at each other.

The book opens with Kamal's party badly losing to a more liberal government. Callie Rose fears the return of her vengeful uncle Jude, and the press fails to mention Jude in connection to the bomb.Tied into this story are the characters of Libby and Troy. Libby has lived her life surrounded by hatred and contempt. She gets some rather unexpected news, but isn’t prepared for what that brings. Troy is Callie’s much younger brother. His family links also place him in danger. When the two students are kidnapped we can’t help but wonder how much family ties will bind people to a decision. A World Book Day release in 2019, and a prequel to Crossfire. Following from the events of Double Cross, a fugitive Dan is mortally wounded by McAuley's former enforcers, and is forced to hide out with a nurse, Eva, whose daughter Avalon committed suicide three years earlier after being drawn into drug addiction and prostitution by McAuley. Though she hides Dan from the criminals hunting him, Eva debates whether to continue sheltering him or turn him in to the police. The novella concludes without revealing the outcome of her decision, but Crossfire suggests that Eva continued to hide Dan but ultimately convinced him to turn himself in, and remained a friend and mother figure to him during his imprisonment and his later career as a gangster. The first Nought Prime Minister, Toney Durbridge, is about to go on trial for the murder of notorious ganglord, Dan Jeavons. Tobey insists he is being framed.

We have Callie, now 30, a lawyer preparing to be a judge. She still regrets her behaviour as a teenager when she let jealousy get the better of her. Her feelings for her boyfriend Tobey were complicated, but even more so now. Tobey is about to become the first Nought Prime Minister, but he is accused of murdering a well-known businessman thought to have underground links. He wants Callie to represent him. On 5 November 2019 BBC News included Noughts & Crosses on its list of the 100 most inspiring novels. [14] Minerva "Minnie" Hadley: Sephy's older sister; she and Sephy are not very close, as Minnie is often shown to be quite selfish. She marries an affluent Cross, Zuri, and they have a son, Taj.

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Accused of a murder he insists he did not commit, Tobey asks his teenage sweetheart Callie-Rose to defend him. The two have a complicated history and, it transpires, an even more complicated – and dangerous – present, and they take it in turns to tell their side of a highly dramatic story. Eva Foxton: An old nurse who becomes a mother figure for Dan, eventually succeeding him as the leader of his gang, the Outfit. While Callie Rose is in hospital, Tobey gets a new job at the Dowds' restaurant. He meets Rebecca, Vanessa Dowd's daughter. Rebecca enjoys his company as he treats her like a person, unlike the other boys who are interested only in her family and money. Tobey eventually goes out with her but is conflicted between her and Callie Rose. Kamal tells Sephy that if she keeps her child, Callum will be hanged, but if she has the abortion, he will serve years in prison instead. Kamal makes a similar offer to Callum, wanting Callum to publicly admit to raping Sephy. Both decide to keep the baby, and Callum is hanged at the gallows. Noughts & Crosses was No. 61 on the Big Read list, a 2003 BBC survey to find "The Nation's Best-Loved Book", with more votes than A Tale of Two Cities, several Terry Pratchett novels and Lord of the Flies.

Sephy - now in her fifties, with her first marriage gone, Sephy enters her relationship with Sonny. Sephy is still the character that we first loved reading about and it’s nice to see her relatively happy in this book. At the time of the series, slavery had been abolished for some time, but segregation, similar to the Jim Crow Laws, continues to operate to keep the Crosses (dark-skinned people) in control of the Noughts (lighter-skinned people). An international organisation, the Pangaean Economic Community, exists. Seeming to be similar to the United Nations in scope but similar to the European Union in powers, it is playing a role in forcing change by directives and boycotts. Britain is known as Albion, Africa is one country called Zafrika, and Scandinavia is too, known as Fenno-Scandia, the only Nought country left. Daniel "Dan" Jeavons: Tobey's friend, who uses Tobey's desperate financial situation to introduce him to gang life. Dan later becomes a mobster and serves time in prison. He comes out and helps Tobey become Prime Minister with dirty tactics. Dan is killed by his butler for impregnating his daughter. Masters, Tim (17 March 2014). "Campaign over gender-specific books gains support". BBC News . Retrieved 24 November 2014.The opening of ‘Crossfire’ reflects how society has changed significantly though there are still tensions especially with the rise of a white supremacy movement Nought Forever. It starts about 18 years after the previous book, Double Cross, and introduces some new characters, Troy and Libby, students who both want to be head student at their school and have an intense rivalry despite being friends, when they were younger. Through a handy family tree at the start of the book we know that Troy is the son of Sephy and the half brother of Callie-Rose and as the book progresses we find out just who Libby’s dad is.