1970s London: Young Michael runs past the railway arches and terraces of Vauxhall. Reaching the street on which he lives, he witnesses a young girl fall from a window, her sari floating down behind her. Her lifeless body lies crumpled on the ground. This incident marks the beginning of a period in which Michael's life threatens to unravel. From his sister's taunts to a series of house fires, police harassment, his parents' crumbling marriage and the realisation that the council intends to clear out the slum he calls home, he learns to navigate his way through an array of obstacles, big and small. An extraordinary debut novel, Vauxhall tells a warm and hopeful story of a young boy and the city that surrounds him. 'A tenderly observed, fascinating portrait of a childhood in South London, as it moves from post-war darkness into an uncertain new era.' Blake Morrison, author of South of the River. -- 'Only a poet could have written Vauxhall - clean, swift and with flashes of lightning' Bonnie Greer. -- 'Immediately appealing, this is quite an odyssey through the maelstrom that London was in the 1970s. A remarkable achievement' Brian Chikwava