Noughts and crosses

by Marjorie Blackman
This is a gripping and totally absorbing novel were blacks, in the story called crosses, and whites, called noughts, don’t mix together. The account is based on what two children, Sephy and Callum live. Although Sephy is a cross and Callum a nought, they’re friends because Callum’s mother worked for Sephy’s family.


Everyone was happy until when four nought children were accepted into a cross’ school. Callum was one of those noughts and it was Sephy’s school. Both of them were very excited about going to the same classroom and talking about their homeworks, their teachers, etc... But when the first day of school started, all the crosses were waiting the noughts to pass to the school, looking at them menacingly and throwing them stones. The police couldn’t stop them. A nought girl was injured in her head, but it wasn’t important and the noughts entered the school.
In school, the four nought children were marginated and the black teachers didn’t like them too much. Sephy didn’t like these attitudes towards the noughts, so one day she sat down with the noughts to eat. The crosses didn’t like these so they marginated her aswell. Callum didn’t want the people to know that Sephy and him were friends because that will ruin their friendship and he got very angry when Sephy started to talk with him during school-time.
Then things got worse, Callum’s daughter, who had been attack because of kissing a nought, remembered what happen, she had been in shock since then, so, she decide to commit suicide by throwing herself in front of a bus. After that things got worse, there was a lot of violence between the nought and crosses that lead into bombs, persecution, etc... Will Sephy and Callum be together??
DP 10