JOE AND NELLY A World War Two ghost story

11 year old Joe returns to wartime London, where ghostly Nelly helps him survive material loss, bombs and a dad missing in action. Eleven year old Joe arrives at Paddington Station. He has returned from evacuation in Wales and is looking forward to getting back to normal with his parents, a working class couple from Bermondsey. But since he has been away a lot has changed: his house has been bombed, his mother has moved into with his grandparents',cramped house and is now working as a clippy on the buses. Joe feels lonely in a house full of adults, who are only interested in listening to the radio for news of the war in Europe. None of his friends have returned from evacuation yet and his school was flattened in the Blitz, so he has nothing and no one to play with. When he can’t cope with the boredom and loneliness, Joe goes off to the crater where his home used to be in the hope of digging up some of his old toys and replaces Nelly, the girl who llved next door.