No Friend of Mine

No Friend of Mine by Ann Turnbull (Walker Books)

PB RRP $14.95

ISBN 9781406324778

Reviewed by Anastasia Gonis

In the second book of the series following Pigeon Summer, it is now 1937. The focus is on Lennie, Mary’s younger brother who just wants to draw all that he sees around him of nature.  Both Mary and her sister Phyl are working, and baby Doreen is now at school. Father has returned but cannot do more than care for the pigeons due to his wheezing miner’s lungs.

At school, boys led by the vicious bully Bert, continue their callous and brutal daily attack on Lennie. A last effort to escape the bullies leads Lennie to the remains of an old stone cottage which becomes a refuge, and place for privacy away from his cramped home.

But rich boy Ralph, whose father owns the mines, has also claimed this place. He too, needs a refuge away from home. They create an imaginative world full of adventure and interest together, and build a friendship; something that neither had ever had before.