Five days to I Predict a Riot’s book birthday! Yes, my latest YA novel hits the shelves till this Thursday, 5th June and to mark all the fives, here are five things you might want to know about I Predict a Riot (but never dared to ask!)
1. I Predict a Riot is the hard-hitting, hilarious and heart-breaking tale of three kids from very different backgrounds who set out to make a movie and end up involved in a riot, in a summer that will change their lives forever.
2. Inspired by the 2011 UK riots, the book is based on the stories of many amazing kids I’ve had the privilege to work with over the years: teenage gang members from South London; street kids in South Africa; as well as the children of politicians and pop stars. Their stories, their voices and their characters inspired what I wrote, but also served to remind me of the responsibility I had in writing about this topic.
3. I Predict a Riot was also inspired by a lesson on Lord of the Flies. I was teaching my Year 10s Golding’s novel, shortly after the UK riots. We ended up having a discussion about how kids ended up rioting and that shaped the novel I went on to write.
4. I set to challenge some of the commonly held assumptions about the kids who got caught up in the riots. I wanted to write an explosive book that would make readers cry … break their hearts … make them angry … make them think!
5. My literary influences are – um – a bit mixed! I Predict a Riot is Meg Rosoff meets ‘Made in Chelsea’, ‘The Knife that Killed Me’ meets ‘The Only way is Essex,’ or ‘Oliver Twist’ meets ‘ meets ‘The Outsiders’ meets ‘Top Boy’ meets ‘Youngers’ – with the odd dash of ‘Pigeon English, Dickens and ‘Son of Rambow’ along the way. Oh, and the Smurfs – they feature too!