Tabitha

Set in a large West Yorkshire council estate, we begin with Tabitha, aged 13, trying to decide where she fits into her world. She is the single child with a single mother. While that is not unusual the fact that her father is black marks her out as different in an otherwise predominantly all-white environment. Tabitha is also different because she has a fascination with the natural world, even delighting in the weeds that grow in the cracks of the paving stones. This passion led her at the age of eight to explore a private walled garden on the perimeter of a wood. As she grows this place becomes her secret garden but she never meets the gardener.

At school life is not easy for for our heroine. She doesn't rate her abilities and she is often bullied - especially by her nemesis, Gareth. But despite this, she discovers teachers who believe in her and life begins to improve, especially as she finds in new friends - refugees from South Sudan and black. Things are on the up until disaster strikes. What is Tabitha going to do? What does the future hold? And where does she belong? Is there anywhere?

What of Gareth? He is a boy who has little thought of the future, bent on taking form life all he can get and controlling those around him, including Tabitha. In her, he encounters a resistance he has nowhere before experienced and he becomes obsessed. How will that affect her and him. Could that alter his destiny?