Harry Bowling – författare

Behind the grimy wharves of Londons dockland lies Conner Street, home to a close-knit community where women stand gossiping in doorways, small boys play marbles on the cobbles and the dockers pop down to the Eagle for a quick pint. Corner shops nestle beside the tiny terraced houses and two minutes away is the lively Tower Road market, where it is said, if you can't buy something then it's not made. Once World War Two breaks out, however, life in Conner Street changes dramatically - for ever...

AS TIME GOES BY by is a vivid portrayal of an East End community struggling to survive the horror of the Blitz. Carter Lane is an ordinary backstreet in Bermondsey and, for Dolly and Mick Flynn, it is home. They've raised their family with not much money but lots of love. When World War Two breaks out they know that nothing will be quite the same again. As the Blitz starts to take its toll and the close-knit community in Carter Lane endures the sorrows and partings which they had dreaded above all else, they find comfort in one another and solace in the knowledge that their wounds will eventually heal - as time goes by. AS TIME GOES BY by is a vivid portrayal of an East End community struggling to survive the horror of the Blitz.

On the night of Saturday 10th May 1941, amidst the horror of the devastation caused by enemy bombers, Joe Carey and Charlie Duggan risked their lives to save people trapped in an air-raid shelter. Despite their efforts, six men and women died.It's now 1947 and the inhabitants of Totterdown Street are trying to rebuild their lives. The post-war years are proving to be difficult and, already faced with a violent factory strike, the close-knit inhabitants of the street must also cope with news which not only exposes the glory of the past but the shame as well.

Paragon Place, an ordinary square of two-up, two-down houses in Bermondsey, has pretty well survived the Blitz. But it's taken its toll on a hard-working and tight-knit community. Despite going through the very worst of times - the never-ending fight against poverty, rationing and bombs - the residents of Paragon Place have been brought closer together by laughter and tears in the face of despair. There is Sally Brady, who is torn between two men, local drunk Alf Porter, the prim Carey sisters, the gossips and the villains. After surviving the horror of the war, they face new dramas as they rebuild their lives together...

Waggoner's Way is a small back street in Bermondsey, home to a close-knit community of predominantly railway folk and their families. The Brennans and Kellys are among those who live there. They have been friends for years; Joe Brennan works as a train driver, Tom Kelly as a shunter; and Ada and Mary, their wives, patiently spend much of their time trying to entangle their children's tangled love lives. And, together, they help one another survive the worst of times.

Cotton Lane in dockland Bermondsey is one of the many small cobbled streets which serve the wharves. On the corner is Bradley's Dining Rooms, the favourite eating place of the rivermen, trade union officials and horse and motor drivers. Since her marriage to Fred Bradley, Carrie has been running the dining rooms, and trade has picked up since the end of the Great War. But all is not well between Carrie and Fred. For although they have a little daughter they adore, neither of them is truly content. Will they ever know true happiness?

Page Street, a shabby, cobbled and gaslit Bermondsey backstreet is home to a diverse and close-knit community fighting an ongoing battle against poverty, hunger and the devastating effects of the Great War.George Galloway owns a cartage business; his right-hand man is William Tanner. William's loyalty has worn thin over the years but he cannot break the ties with Galloway because times are hard and the house in which he lives belongs to him. Carrie Tanner grows up in the heart of a poor yet loving family, but as she becomes a young woman she becomes involved in the Suffragette movement. The times are changing - and quickly. Will this close-knit community be able to pull together or will it be torn apart?

Salmon Lane is a quiet Bermondsey backstreet lined with modest brick houses and paved with cobbles. For Carrie Tanner it's home. She's worked hard to build her own business and has earned the grudging respect of her business rivals - even the Galloways, both father and son. Personal feuds, though, are overshadowed by the outbreak of the Second World War, which brings the terrors of the Blitz to the neighbourhood. This close-knit community is forced to draw on all their reserves of courage and humour to survive the difficulties of poverty, rationing and nightly air raids. And even as the men are called up, go missing in action or are killed, and homes are bombed, their extraordinary Cockney spirit shines through ...

Ironmonger Street in 1920, with its ugly tenement blocks and tumbledown houses, is one of the most unsightly turnings in Bermondsey; its residents are hardened to the grim poverty of their lives.In the slum block, Jubilee Dwellings, two sisters - attractive, fun-loving Kate Morgan and the happily married Helen Bartlett - give birth to daughters. One is illegitimate, her mother refusing to name the father, the other is disabled. Connie and Molly grow up together and wouldn't be parted for the world. Until the day Connie catches the eye of handsome Robert Armitage. Despite the differences in their backgrounds, and the antagonism that dogs their two families, they are drawn together and are determined to be married. Until war intervenes ...

It's 1946 and the close-knit community of Pedlar's Row in Bermondsey is full of curiosity about the new family, the Priors, moving into number three. Laura Prior is enjoying the excitement of her new home - not least because of her growing attraction to docker Billy Cassidy. But her sister, Lucy, is finding life harder: rationing, a shortage of homes, a husband who is emotionally scarred from his internment in a POW camp, and her guilt about a wartime affair, make it difficult to settle into married life.

When widowed Ida Farran runs off with a bus inspector in 1949, she leaves her five children to fend for themselves. Preoccupied with the day-to-day task of earning enough money to keep the family together, eighteen-year-old Rose battles bravely on, thankful for the mysterious benefactor who pays the rent on their flat in Imperial Buildings on Fellmonger Street. Life isn't easy but between them Rose and her younger brother Don just about manage to make ends meet. Recently, however, Don has become rather too friendly with the Morgan boys. Everyone knows the small-time Bermondsey villains are a bad lot. But even this concern pales into insignificance when Rose finds herself pregnant. Now it'll need a miracle to keep the Farrans of Fellmonger Street together.

When Kate Flanagan sits in the Old Bailey court room and hears the seven year sentence for armed robbery being passed on her husband, she knows that now is the time to get free of him and make a new life for herself and her two children. Forced to quit her terraced house in Bermondsey for rent arrears, Kate has to take the unpalatable step of moving to a slum tenement block in Milldyke Street, Dockhead. Here she meets the attractive Amy Almond whose friendship opens new doors of opportunity for fresh relationships. When Kate stumbles over the murdered body of a single woman who lived in the next block, she realises that she, herself, could be a target. She turns to the attractive and sympathetic Sergeant Cassidy for protection and finds that her emotions, as well as her life, are in danger...

Susan Parry is twenty-one and impatiently awaiting the return of her fiancé, Alan Woodley, from the army. Although her father has been dead for many years, Susan's memories of her parents' marriage are happy ones and she looks forward to the day when she and Alan can share in that happiness. But the discovery of some old letters soon forces her to face some bitter truths about her parents - and even the nature of love itself...

Saddler Street is like many of the other little backstreets of Bermondsey, with its row of two-up, two-down terraced houses standing in the shadow of Allen's Wharf. Number 5 is home to the Johnson family, but the atmosphere inside the four walls is not always as happy as the neighbours may think. Lana Johnson - young, intelligent and strikingly attractive - is getting serious with the local small-time villain, Ben Ferris. And everyone except Lana herself is sure that the match will end in tears. Next door to the Johnsons lives Lottie Curtis, a kind-hearted widow they have taken under their wing. For decades Lottie has been foster mother to children from broken homes. Only Jimmy Bailey has ever demonstrated in a practical way the debt he owed to Lottie - until the war intervened and he was called up. But it's 1946 and Lottie is facing her eightieth birthday alone. When Jimmy, now demobbed, teams up with Lana to organise a reunion of all the old lady's children as a birthday treat, there's more than one surprise in store...