- A hard living, disillusioned, ex social worker becomes the unlikely savior to an anarchic gang of joy-riding, drug taking, thieving, out of control, care home runaway kids.
- Based on Bernard Hare's Orwell-nominated memoir Urban and The Shed Crew. 11-year-old Urban's been running away from care since he was 5 (6 care homes and 8 foster homes in 6 years); he's Britain's most runaway child...When he can't find his mum, he sleeps rough on the streets, or in a shed with other runaways, The Shed Crew'. He's never known a dad, just his mentally-ill addict mum Greta. So when she meets Chop, the first decent bloke they've ever known, Urban feels hope for the first time. For Chop, the once idealistic ex-social worker, it's a chance of redemption. He takes in the broken family, helps Greta, teaches Urban and his brother Frank lessons in life. But the family's new-found happiness is all too fleeting as Greta's propensity to self-destruct proves too strong...leaving Urban to cope with the fallout the only way he knows.
- It's been described as a tale of heroin and cement, set in Britain's underclass in the 90s.
Twelve-year old Urban Grimshaw is Britain's most runaway child, he's even been on TVs Crimewatch. His mother is a junkie and his father might as well be dead. He can't read or write, and he doesn't go to school. His average day is spent sitting around a bonfire with his mates smoking drugs and stealing cars. When he meets his mother's new friend Chop, a 37 year old, disillusioned, ex-social worker also living on society's margins, on one of Leeds roughest estates, the two become firm friends.
But even Chop with his own penchant for drink, drugs and hard living is shocked by the state of Urban's life. After much soul searching he resolves to clean up his own act and save the kid. But as their friendship deepens, Urban introduces him to the Shed Crew the anarchic gang of kids aged between ten and fourteen years who spend their time joy-riding, thieving, and engaging in drugs and sex. It is only then that we see exactly how long the road to civilization really is.
When ex-social worker Bernard Hare turned his startling experiences with a group of young delinquents into a novel it was described as one of the year's most compelling and best selling books. Urban and the Shed Crew is a stunning piece of ethnography described by The Guardian as moving but never sanctimonious, another City of God, this time for Britain rather than Brazil.
Contribute to this page
Suggest an edit or add missing content