It was on a Sunday night in 1928 that Billy Hopkins made his first appearance. Billy's tenement home on the outskirts of Manchester would be considered a slum today but he lived there happily with his large Catholic family hatching moneymaking schemes. When war came Billy was evacuated to Blackpool. There he lived on a starvation diet while his own rations went to feed his landlady's children - I might as well be in Strangeways! But even the cruel blows that were dealt to the family on his return to Manchester would not destroy Billy's fighting spirit - or his sense of humour. Nostalgic sad and funny the bestseller *Our Kid* recalls an upbringing and an environment now vanished.