Respect: A raw, gritty drama you won't put down

Chantelle has everything going against her.

She's a good student who only wants to pass her exams and find a way out of the sink estate in Manchester where she grew up. But now her feckless mother has taken off for Spain with her latest boyfriend and she's single-handedly raising her tearaway nine-year-old brother Leon.

She thinks her worst problem is the debt collectors at the door. But Leon has made some new friends: teenage gang members who have given him a mobile phone, a knife - and some drugs to hide in her flat.

A part-time job seems to be the answer to Chantelle's prayers. But the violence is about to come home to her - with a vengeance.

And the only person who's offering any help seems to be just as bad as the people she's trying to escape from . . .

Mandasue Heller was born in Cheshire and moved to Manchester in 1982. She spent ten years living in the notorious Hulme Crescents which have since become the background to her novels. Not only is she a talented writer, but she has also sung in cabaret and rock groups, seventies soul cover bands and blues jam bands.

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