Jess is a single mother to two teenage children, and although life can be tough she’s just about keeping things together. But when her landlord asks her to move on, so he can sell the house they’re living in without warning, Jess’s worries take on a whole new meaning. As Jess struggles to regain her footing, cracks begin to appear in other areas of her life, and suddenly she feels she’s failing at everything. Her daughter Hazel is becoming more and more distant, her son Jacob is struggling to find where he fits in the world, and the menacing spectre of Jess’s older brother, someone she cut out of her life years ago, begins to make his presence felt again.
Jess knows she’s the only one who can keep her family together, but how can she keep going when life keeps beating her back?
Set in East London, These Streets is a searing and powerful novel that explores how we are meant to find our place in a world that is designed for only the privileged to succeed. Beautiful and honest, it is an essential story about living in Britain today.
“These Streets turns a spotlight on the strength and resilience required to overcome physical and emotional adversity that never should have been yours in the first place. ”
“This is a novel as uplifting as it is terrifying. I laughed as often as I was enraged at a system that seems set up to fail”