X-Fire (pronounced "Cross Fire") is the ostensible leader of the Dell Farm Crew. X-Fire has a ferocious pit bull and recruits young children, like Harri and Jordan, into his crew by assigning them dangerous and illegal initiation "missions." X-Fire compels Lydia to destroy evidence and threatens Harri repeatedly. Auntie Sonia

Someone sets the local playground on fire, but firemen arrive and put the fire out. On the last day of school, Harri watches with delight as the Year 11 kids celebrate their newfound freedom. He and Poppy hold hands, and she kisses him. Harri runs home, shouting his love for Poppy, the pigeons, and the trees. When Harri is almost home, a boy jumps out and stabs him. That's why I have to help him now, he was my friend even if he didn't know about it. He was my first friend who got killed and it hurts too much to forget. Harri, March

Lying in front of Harrison Opoku is a body, the body of one of his classmates, a boy known for his crazy basketball skills, who seems to have been murdered for his dinner. It is Harri's wide-eyed innocence that makes this book so endearing and a riveting, fascinating read. Harri is definitley one of the best and most authentic narrators I have read for a while. He is intelligent, loveable, always funny and has a great way of observing his surroundings that create, even if his language is simplistic and sometimes misused, a perfect picture in your mind. Pigeon English is organized into five segments, each narrating a different month in a single year of Harri's life, from March to July. Each section opens with an icon that is relevant to the section: for example, the chapter "April," accompanied by the image of a fingerprint, discusses how Auntie Sonia burned off her fingerprints to evade deportation, and Harri and Dean also search for the killer's fingerprints by the river.

There are three aspects to this debut novel that are probably going to make or break the average reader's reaction to it. The first is that it is largely plotless -- instead it follows an 11-year-old immigrant from Ghana as he makes his way around the impoverished London estate new home. The second is that it is narrated in his broken, or "pidgin" English. And the third is that at the start and end of some chapters, it also features some first-pigeon narration from, well, a pigeon. In May, there is a carnival in Harri’s neighborhood. On Sunday, church is cancelled because someone smashed the windows and wrote DFC all over the wall. Harri argues with Lydia about the clothes she bleached. Harri insists he saw blood on them, but Lydia tells him that it was Miquita’s blood—“girl’s blood.”Auntie Sonia is Mamma's sister who resides as an undocumented citizen in London. Auntie Sonia works a series of odd jobs, such as housekeeping, and burns off her fingerprints to avoid deportation. Auntie Sonia suffers domestic abuse from her partner, Julius, a gangster who sells fake visas and collects debts. After Julius breaks Auntie Sonia's nose and foot, she escapes London. Terry Takeaway

Newly arrived from Ghana with his mother and older sister Lydia, Harri absorbs the many strange elements of city life, from the bewildering array of Haribo sweets, to the frightening, fascinating gang of older boys from his school. But his life is changed forever when one of his friends is murdered.I'm sure Mr. Kelman has created some loveable characters but sadly, I could feel no sympathy towards any of them. Yes, even Harri. Eleven-year-old Harrison Opoku, the second best runner in Year 7, races through his new life in England with his personalised trainers - the Adidas stripes drawn on with marker pen - blissfully unaware of the very real threat around him. Newly-arrived from Ghana with his mother and older sister Lydia, Harri absorbs the many strange elements of city life, from the bewildering array of Haribo sweets, to the frightening, fascinating gang of older boys from his school. But his life is changed forever when one of his friends is murdered. As the victim's nearly new football boots hang in tribute on railings behind fluorescent tape and a police appeal draws only silence, Harri decides to act, unwittingly endangering the fragile web his mother has spun around her family to keep them safe. The title Pigeon English immediately emphasizes that the novel is concerned with questions of linguistic and cultural hybridity. The word “pidgin” refers to a hybrid language developed so people who speak different languages can communicate with one another—usually in a colonial context. Pidgin English, therefore, refers to languages that hybridize English with another language. The title of this book, Pigeon English, is a play on words, echoing Harri’s idiosyncratic use of language, as he mixes British English with Ghanaian slang and Pidgin English (and, of course, the title also gestures to Harri’s love of pigeons). Harri makes an effort to assimilate into London culture by studying and imitating the ways in which English is spoken in London. However, considering that London, its customs, and its slang are constituted by different multiethnic factions, Harri adds to the culture rather than assimilating into it.