Of course, Hector’s interactions with the community lead to personal growth. He is still frustrating, and thoughtless or hurtful at times, but he begins to understand how his actions affect others. Raúf handles his development in a very natural way, taking care to show gradual change without overwriting his actual character.

I love the writing. However, I find the characters problematic (I cannot leave out a single character who is not one). I find the plot too familiar. Sounds like a children's mystery story retold and the bad characters aren't convincing at all. I also have a wider knowledge of the homeless after reading this, and I don't think I could ever walk past a person on the street in the same way again. I am grateful for this insight into the challenges and terrors that these people face in their daily lives and have even more respect for them than I did before.I've been getting into trouble for as long I can remember. Usually I don't mind 'cos some of my best, most brilliant ideas have come from sitting in detention.

I enjoyed this story very much - the tranformation of the main character, Hector, from nasty bully to hero was relatively simplistic, but effective and powerful. The winners of The Farshore Reading for Pleasure Teacher Awards 2023, highlighting the work schools are doing to encourage a love of reading, have... I would have liked the book better if it wasn't realistic contemporary fiction but it's supposed to be one so I just have to be realistic when it comes to my opinion on the book. Skateboarding around Piccadilly Circus with a friend on afternoon, Hector decides to stay longer by himself, when his sees the homeless man, whose trolley he'd sunk and whose name he has learned is Thomas, suddenly appear and break into a run. Naturally, when another statue goes missing, Hector is convinced it's Thomas doing it, and decides to find him and turn him over to the police. And to do that, he needs to enlist the help of Mei-Li, but will she help someone who she clearly does not like? And together can Mei-Li and Thomas help Hector overcome his need to be bad? I waited for him to shout and scream. But he didn’t. Instead, he took off his yellow hat and his shoulders began to shake. That was how I knew that he was crying.Hector is very nasty piece of work at the start of the book. He is an archetypal bully with two henchman and a serious attitude problem. But because Hector is telling the story we soon realise that he is dealing with troubles of his own, and as we know, most bullies are troubled humans.

I don’t think Raúf has put a foot wrong so far with her novels to date – and this is no exception. Told from the interesting perspective of the bully in school, Hector gains our sympathy quite unexpectedly – we can see how and why he gets the blame, often deservedly, but also when it’s not really his fault. The three way chats, in which they are joined by other animals, about web spinning, themselves, other humans—are as often informative as amusing, and the whole tenor of appealing wit and pathos will make fine entertainment for reading aloud, too. Hector, 10-years-old and a middle child, has always been a bully and a prankster. And subsequently spending a lot of time in the principal's office. From the beginning, it's clear that Hector thinks very little of most people, and often does what he does just to annoy them. For example, as the book opens, Hector is about to drop a second rubber snake into the school's lunch soup, and even as the principal warns him not to, Hector defiantly does it anyway, knowing he will be in trouble. He always to derive satisfaction knowing he's ruin something for someone with his pranks. But, for him, it's ok, after all, his friends Will and Katie always think his antics are funny. What an emotional book. For becoming a bully, to a hero. He was the main bully at his class with Will and Katie and were bullying kids.Told from the perspective of a bully, this book explores themes of bullying and homelessness, while celebrating kindness, friendship and the potential everyone has to change for the good. On their way home, Will and Katie tease Hector about being slow and getting caught. Angered by the teasing, Hector decides to show them how wrong they are. Seeing a homeless man asleep on a bench next to his trolley full of what appears to be trash, Hector decides to steal the hat the old man always wears. But when he wakes up and catches at them, they run off with the hat. He’s got so little sympathy for a local homeless man Thomas (who is taking up space in the park, including a bench Hector would like to sit on) that he ends up pushing Thomas’s trolley containing his only worldly possessions into the park pond without a single thought of how much hurt that would cause. Getting in trouble is what Hector does best. He knows that not much is expected of him. In fact, he gets some of his most brilliant prank ideas while sitting in detention. Unfortunately, I did not enjoy this book. It's written in the perspective of a bully and though the ending seemingly redeemed the main character, Hector, to the majority of the audience, I couldn't forget the first few stages of the book. I really enjoyed Onjali Q. Rauf's 'Lion above the door' and was disappointed with this book.

The character arc is absolutely brilliant, indeed is the heart of the story. From an uncaring, cruel bully, to an empathetic, considerate hero. His partner in not-crime is Mei-Li, who helps at her father’s local soup kitchen and so acts as the connection between Hector and the homeless community. She is smart, but also brave and principled, and written with such passion that you can’t help but feel immediately supportive and defensive of her. The compassion she shows to the homeless is a welcome contrast to Hector’s sullenness. The night bus hero is about a boy called hector (he is a bully)who goes around being naughty to loads of people .He takes sweets of little children and is horrible to them.He has got two friends who are also very naughty.One day he thinks he has found a thief and blames it on a homeless man (Thomas).When he works out it wasn’t him they work together to find the real thief .When they work it out and catches them they are so relieved(they also turn into best friend. I appreciate the themes of this story: problematic kids being misunderstood (but also I couldn't ignore the fact that the main character and his friends are bullies and they are actually problematic), busy working parents with three small kids (but also negligence at its best..or worse I would say), judging the homeless (but also entrusting your kids to their company blindly... that's unrealistic)... I know I shouldn't judge a middle grade book like this but this is the kind of book I have issues for the same.

Her first took in the serious topic of refugees but mixed it with friendship, school and the Queen. Now the author gives young readers a little journey into the world of homelessness and adds to that a bully and a series of high-profile London thefts. She's not afraid of a challenge, and yet again makes a warming and insightful plot out of disparate elements that work together nicely. In this literacy activity, your LKS2 class will have to find evidence from the text to support the statements given.