Terence J Goodchild

Lancelot Bottomley The Reluctant Knight Terence J Goodchild

This is the story of a boy named Lancelot Bottomley from the concept of his birth down the birth canal to the christening, and how in his own words he lives with his silly name his parents have given him, on account his mother had the hots for Richard Gere in the film( The First Knight). It tells the story through his eyes and words of his experiences going to infant school, then on to secondary school and how he had to put up with the taunts and innuendos regarding his name and then puberty and the hormones of a teenager and what to do with them. One night he finds a case of money dropped off in a garbage bin by some gang as payment for services rendered, but Lancelot takes it home not knowing it is counterfeit money left to be laundered by the gang, the one who lost the money gets beat up and is thrown out a speeding car in front of Lancelot he rings the ambulance the man vows to find who has taken the money from the drop off place, but comes to meet the lad who rang for help not knowing it was he who stole the money but later finds out. Lancelot starts to spend the money in small amounts buts gets greedy and is found out by the police who want to catch the gang There are many names written into the story and play on words like Arthur, King the bingo owner where Lancelot gets a part time job, Arthurs wife Gwen and daughter Vera, the Pakistani girl Yasmin and Mr Patel her father, Mr Shah and his nephew Sharif of Nottingham. Ivan the bully from secondary school, Mr Gisborne the teacher all names of people from stories like Robin Hood and King Arthur