One Blood: Inside Britain's New Street Gangs

In 2008, the UK saw over 70 brutal killings of teenagers by teenagers. Knife crime --and now gun crime -- affects every community, and Britains' gangs have changed in recent years, becoming more aggressive, more territorial -- and younger. One Blood is the first full-length study of Britain's new gang culture. The author has talked to dozens of gang members from high-ranking to low, and every chapter is based on first-hand testimonies of their day-to-day reality, laying the groundwork for a comprehensive analysis of what gang life does to society and to individuals. With a strong narrative that travels the country from London to Liverpool and beyond, One Blood provides a terrifying account of what life is like for those who belong to a gang. It also investigates how the authorities are attempting to combat the problem, and analyses the social evils of which gang life is a symptom, not a cause. Fearless, uncompromising and compulsively readable, this explosive book is an abiding portrait of an unfortunate section of British society, how it ended up this way, and what can be done to help it.