Author(s): Ann Turnbull

Middle Fiction 8-12-year-olds

Times are hard but a young girl clings to her dreams in this powerful and poignant historical novel. It is 1930, the height of the Great Depression. Mary Dyer's father has left home in search of work, leaving his beloved racing pigeons in Mary's care - much to her mother's disapproval. During that long, hard summer there is barely enough money for bread, let alone pigeon feed, yet Mary clings to her dreams of racing glory, propelling her into ever deeper conflict with her mother. This is the first engaging novel in the Pigeon Summer trilogy, following the fortunes of the Dyer children, Mary, Lennie and Doreen, growing up in a Shropshire mining town before and during World War II. It was shortlisted for the 1992 Smarties Book Prize and the WH Smith Mind Boggling Books Award, as well as being dramatized for TV and radio.