Too Small for Basketball Book

Too Small for Basketball is a novel that is hard to put down, and also hard to define. Ostensibly a coming-of-age tale of an adolescent boy in the 1980s, growing up in the "land of roundabouts" that makes up commuter-belt Britain, it secretes within its narrative folds the cruelty of the world for children. Kris Kenway stakes out the chapters of the book with height markers, following his hero Marlow, as he first fails to grow as a young teenager and then becomes over six foot in late adolescence. As Marlow is small for his age, he becomes the easy target of school bullies, suffering silently for three years. He stops speaking much to his parents, has bouts of illness through his loathing of school and finds friendship only with kids from outside his school. The years of misery, though, are described as if through a fog: Kenway makes clear that Marlow's childhood experiences are unbearable and crushing, so that Marlow himself is not in touch with them. He has distanced himself from them, and they are described dispassionately, almost wryly.On the surface, this novel is a tale of normal teenage angst and dysfunctional families in 1980s Britain. Marlow has a pretty little sister who is as vivacious as he is quiet; a mother who nags; and a father who works too hard. But then, digging deeper into the story, darker secrets than Marlow's bullying are found hiding. Kenway has layered and spiralled the narrative so that whispers emerge from beneath the linear shape. These would gather dust in the reader's mind if it were not for the intriguing first chapter and the presence of Marlow's blonde sister Cress and her friend Lucy's sister Peri. --Olivia DickinsonRead More