{"product_id":"the-kingfisher-by-phyllis-bottome-hardcover","title":"The Kingfisher, by Phyllis Bottome (Hardcover)","description":"\u003cp\u003eIn the soot-choked streets of a factory town, a boy learns that survival means striking first. His father’s drunken rages rule the household, school offers little but the cane, and the only world beyond the slum comes glimpsed through a hole in a circus tent. Yet inside his hard little head, questions multiply faster than anyone will answer them.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eA chance kindness — the loan of books from a well-meaning visitor — cracks open a door onto other worlds. He devours everything he can find, dreaming of schoolrooms, universities, and a life measured by more than blows and hunger. Then one Saturday afternoon, long-brewing violence erupts, and a single act of desperate defence destroys everything he knows.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eSent to a penitentiary while still a child, he keeps his spirit alive on remembered stories and stubborn hope. Offered a safe, respectable future within the very walls that confine him, he dreams instead of barges, open sky, and a life answerable to no one. Which freedom will he choose — and what will it cost?\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Wildside Press LLC","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43189370159313,"sku":"9781667669458","price":29.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0555\/5981\/5377\/files\/9781667669458_FC.jpg?v=1784549254","url":"https:\/\/startlingstories.us\/products\/the-kingfisher-by-phyllis-bottome-hardcover","provider":"Startling Stories","version":"1.0","type":"link"}