Billy Casper is a fifteen-year-old with no future, growing up in poverty and seemingly destined to follow his older brother into a life of toil in the coal mines.
But a spark of hope enters Billy\'s lonely existence when he discove.
Nor are things better at school, where Billy is tormented by the other kids and treated as a troublemaker by the teachers.
Life at home is hard: his father has left, his mother\'s main interest is in picking up men at the pub, and his brother bullies him mercilessly.
Billy Casper is a fifteen-year-old with no future, growing up in poverty and seemingly destined to follow his older brother into a life of toil in the coal mines