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Recommended by Jonny Kay (@jonnykayteacher)
Form and genre: prose novel, fantasy, young adult
Length: 224 pages
Summary: Borribles are outcast runaways who live in London. Apart from their pointed ears, they look just like children and have one enemy: the Rumbles – giant, rat-shaped creatures who are their ancient enemy. Fearing an invasion of Rumbles, an elite group of Borribles set out on The Great Rumble Hunt.
Age recommendation and challenging content: Occasional offensive language. I’d recommend this for Y8.
Notable reasons for recommending this book: Written in the late 70s (with 2 additional books making up a trilogy), the books have a strong anti-authoritarian flavour. The third book was written to coincide with the 1985 riots in London and was not published due to its anti-authoritarian content (it was later published as part of a trilogy).