Rusty and Friends

This new children’s book from Birmingham-based author Marianne Parry is full of values and virtues. An engaging trio of stories about family, friends and childhood for children aged 9 and up, Rusty and Friends deals with a variety of social issues including mixed race, the elderly and children with a parent in prison.
“I have a great deal of empathy with children who have problems at home,” says Marianne, an experienced primary school teacher who, now retired, voluntarily teaches for local schools, including Special Educational Needs schools.
The book follows Rusty, a sensitive boy who is dismayed to learn that the father he loves is a thief. Supported by two friends, Willie and a West Indian boy Sylvester, he endures the taunts of the tough children at his school. His affection for his father never falters and when his father becomes involved in a prison escape against his will, he learns that his father can also be a hero.
Willie is also involved in several misguided attempts to remove his grandmother from an old people’s home, with Rusty and Sylvester lending a helping hand where they can! The three friends also come up with a plan to break down Sylvester’s grandparents’ prejudice against his white mother, but will it be effective?

Marianne Parry has had songs, poems, short stories and short biographies commercially published. She has also written pantomimes for church productions, oddments for other publishers and several children’s stories and adult mysteries, which she hopes to publish in the future. A retired primary school teacher, Marianne currently teaches R.E. topics voluntarily for local schools. She recently published Tales of Wabasso, a children’s book of Native American Indian stories.