Teaser Tuesday! Featuring Gary William Murning

 Children of the Resolution 

It was a time of change and new ideologies, a vision of a more inclusive, fairer future... a time that was destined to shape the lives of many, and fail more than a mere handful.

Viewed retrospectively through the eyes of the now adult Carl Grantham, Children of the Resolution is a story of a child poised between two worlds. Thrown into the revolutionary world of integrated education in 1970s England, the physically disabled Carl finds himself torn between what he expects of himself and what his changing environment will allow.

At heart, a coming-of-age story -- Children of the Resolution explores the intricacies of friendship and loss, the subtle fears of childhood and the far less subtle fears of adulthoods possibly never realised.

Excerpt:

A grey-haired, bespectacled woman dressed in a nurse’s uniform that wasn’t quite a nurse’s uniform was waiting for us in the milk-sour lobby. Dad had lifted me out of the car and put me in my pushchair (this was a time before I got my first, bright red wheelchair), and as he wheeled me towards the woman I would come to know as Mrs. Attenborough, I felt myself becoming smaller as she loomed ever-nearer. She looked mean, with little hairs growing on her chinny-chin-chin and a pencilled-in frown—but when she saw us, she smiled and became a totally different and much nicer person. It was a good trick, and I was momentarily impressed.

            

“Let me guess,” she said, going down on her haunches in front of me. She had big knees. “You must be Carl. Yes?” I thought about shaking my head, just to see what would happen—but instead nodded. “Excellent! It’s very nice to meet you, Carl,” she said, shaking my hand. “My name’s Mrs. Attenborough and I’m one of the people who’ll be looking after you while you’re at Sunnyvale.”

I was about to tell her that I hated the place, but Dad skilfully cut me off at the pass. “He’s a little nervous,” he said.

             

Mrs. Attenborough got to her feet again, smiling and shaking first Dad’s and then Mam’s hands. “Understandable,” she said. “But there’s really no need. He’ll love it here once he settles in. Won’t you, Carl?”

             

I shrugged. My throat was aching again. Mrs. Attenborough was nice, but I didn’t want to be left here with her and her knees.

            

“Can we go home, now?” I asked Mam.

            

“Home?” Mrs. Attenborough said before Mam could answer (a bit rude, I thought.) “You’ve only just got here, pet. There’s still so much more to see and do.” She took my pushchair from Dad and started wheeling me away, Mam and Dad trotting to keep up. “Come on. Let’s have a look around, shall we?”

             

“Then can I go home?”

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