Mike Healey

Kofi and the Climbing Boy Mike Healey

The year is 1753. When Jack - a child sweep - gets stuck up a chimney in Buckingham Palace, all hell breaks out. But Jack somehow survives and for seven weeks lives in the palace's maze of chimneys, coming out at night to steal food and drink - and anything else he can lay his thieving hands on! Later, Jack becomes friends with Kofi - a black African slave (blackamoor) who is staying at the palace with his wealthy owner, Lady Evelyn Lowther. Their adventures at night in the palace and their dramatic escape into the sewers of london is just the start of their adventures. This is not a children's book but a tale of slavery, exploitation and the sexual mores of Georgian England