Danny the Champion of the World

Danny lives with his father in an old gypsy caravan behind the filling station they own, it had been this way since Dannys Mother had died when he was just four months old and Danny would not have it any other way. His father taught him so many things, from being able to strip and clean an engine in the workshop to the names of all the local flora and fauna. But Dannys father had a secret, a longing that he had kept in check all the while he raised Danny but eventually gave in to when Danny was nine years old. Danny awake one night to notice the absence of his fathers steady breathing, a quick look in his bed confirmed that he was not asleep nor was he in the workshop next to the filling station. Hours passed with Danny sitting on the caravan steps waiting and worrying before he finally sees his father walking down the country lane towards their caravan, and when he realizes that Danny is awake he shares with him the most amazing secret, a secret that will change their lives. I loved the far intent look on my Fathers face when he was telling a story. His face was pale and still and distant, unconscious of everything around him. Dannys father had been at Hazels woods; Victor Hazel was a despised brewery owner who according to Danny`s father - had ideas way above his station. He owned virtually all of the land surrounding the filling station and could be seen shooting along the country lanes in his silver Rolls Royce. His crowning passion was the fact that he owned one of the best pheasant woods in southern England, woods in which he held an annual start of season shoot for the rich and gentry. Danny`s father had been doing a spot of poaching, a practice that it seems virtually everyone thereabouts partook in such was the universal hatred for Victor Hazel. And now, with the opening shoot fast approaching Danny hits upon a marvelous idea, an idea so clever and yet so simple that it simply has to be tried, an idea so ingenious it could change the face of poaching forever.. It is impossible to tell you how much I loved my father. When he was sitting close to me on my bunk I would reach out and slide my hand into his, and then he would fold his long fingers around my fist, holding it tight. What I have been trying so hard to tell you all along is simply that my father, without the slightest doubt, was the most marvelous and exciting father any boy ever had.

Danny the Champion of the World

"Danny loves his dad and their cozy life in the gypsy caravan behind the filling station where his father works. They tell stories, build hot air balloons, and work on cars together. But Danny discovers his father's exciting secret. His father is a pheasant poacher! Can Danny help his father beat mean Mr. Hazel and catch the most pheasants of ALL TIME?!" "Danny, an obedient, caring, and well-cultured boy was brought up by his father with lots of care and love. A strong bond and attachment had formed. Danny thought himself to be lucky to have a father like he had. Danny was so attached to his father and trusted him so much, that the idea of his father hiding something from him did not even cross his mind. But one day, 9-year old Danny found the truth to the one secret that his father had hidden from him. He woke up one night to find that he was the only one at home. He found that his father had gone out. That night, Danny found out his father's one vice; hunting pheasants. He also found his father's biggest enemy, Victor Hazell. Victor Hazell was a famous, rich landowner, who was known for his pheasants. A season for pheasant hunting occurred every year on his land. It was very popular. Danny found out that his father wanted to make his rival's event a failure. But his father's plans weren't working. Suddenly, Danny hatched an excellent plan. The twosome had only two days, to kill a lot of pheasants. So, they got to work. Danny and his father filled berries with sleeping powder. They knew that the pheasants ate berries, and planned to put all the pheasants to sleep and take them away. So, they got a lot of berries ready, and then set them for the pheasants."

Danny the Champion of the World

Danny, whose mother died when he was still a baby, lived with his father in a caravan. His father was a mechanic and had his filling station in the countryside close to the caravan. They lived in simplicity but in spite of this Danny had a great relationship with his father who walked him to and from school two miles away. All was going well when one night Danny woke up and did not find his father sleeping in the bunk above his. He went outside to wait for him and upon his return his father revealed that he had been poaching! Danny was flabbergasted because he hadn't expected that his father was some sort of a thief. However, his father explained the art of poaching and how almost every creditable person in the village was part of it. Undoubtedly Danny was intrigued! After an unfortunate event where his father ended up in a pit hurting his leg and rescued by Danny himself, Danny devised a genius plan to get as many pheasants as possible to disrupt a hunting party. Using his father's untouched sleeping pills in juicy raisins, they tricked the pheasants that were soon falling off branches! Nevertheless, this meticulous plan almost failed when the pheasants were recovering from the effect of the sleeping pills the following morning!

Danny the Champion of the World

Danny's mother died suddenly when he was only four months old and from then on he lived with his father in an old Gypsy vardo at the back of a filling station, where his father fixed cars. By the time Danny was seven years old, he was able to take apart, and then put back together a switch motor. Danny's father owns the filling station, and it is the only piece of land for miles around that was not owned by a wealthy but unpleasant local man called Mr. Victor Hazell, who owns a brewery and drives around in a silver Rolls-Royce. After Mr. Hazell threatens Danny and Danny's father subsequently refuses to give him service, various inspectors come to visit them, including a health inspector who said he was concerned about the condition of the caravan, and another inspector who wanted to check that the petrol being sold was of an adequate standard. Danny's father is convinced that Mr. Hazell was having these inspectors sent in to try and drive them out, and this makes him furious. When Danny is nine years old, he wakes up in the middle of the night and is unable to find his father. When his father eventually returns, he says that he'd been to poach pheasants from Hazell's Wood. Danny's father then lets Danny in on a secret of poaching: pheasants love raisins, and placing a raisin inside a "Sticky Hat" (a piece of paper rolled into a cone shape with glue on the inside) is the perfect trap with which to catch a pheasant, since it won't run away if it can't see. Another trick that Danny's dad taught him was the "Horse-Hair Stopper": A horse's tailhair, when threaded through a raisin, would cause the raisin (upon swallowing) to become lodged in the pheasant's throat. This in turn causes the pheasant to become so preoccupied with trying to swallow the raisin that a poacher can easily catch it. Other methods are less effective. Soaking the raisins in gin to make the pheasant drunk only works if the bird eats more than a dozen of them. One evening, Danny's father goes poaching and promises to be back no later than 10:30 p.m. Danny, waking at 2.10am, discovers his father's absence. Fearing the worst, he sets off in an Austin Seven motor car that his father has been repairing, but while driving along the road he notices a car in the distance. He eventually passes the car and realises that it's the police, who then come back to pursue him. However, the windy layout of the road makes it easy for Danny to drive through a gap in a hedge without being seen, and the police car races past. He finds his father in Hazell's Wood, where he has fallen down a specially-dug pit-trap and suffered a broken ankle, and eventually manages to get him back to the car. They head home, where they call Doc Spencer, a good friend of

Danny's father and a fellow poacher, to treat Danny's father for his injury. Danny's father is prescribed strong sleeping pills to deal with the pain of his broken ankle, but declines to use them. While Danny's father is recovering from his injury, they hear that Mr. Hazell's annual pheasant-shooting party is approaching, which he hosts to curry favor and prestige among the gentry. They decide to humiliate him by luring all the pheasants away from the forest, so there will be no pheasants to shoot. Danny suggests that they should put the contents of sleeping tablets inside raisins which the pheasants will then eat; his father dubs this new method the "Sleeping Beauty." Having poached 120 pheasants from Mr. Hazell's woods, they hide the drugged pheasants at the local vicar's house, while they take a taxi home. The next morning, the vicar's wife delivers the sleeping pheasants in a speciallybuilt oversized baby carriage. As she is walking toward them, the pheasants began to wake up and fly, but they droopily fall back down. An angry Hazell arrives at the filling station just as the pheasants are waking up. With the help of Sgt. Samways, the local constable, Danny and his father herd the groggy birds onto Hazell's Rolls Royce, where they scratch the paintwork and defecate all over it, inside and out. Once the pheasants have woken completely, they fly away from the scene - in the opposite direction from Hazell's wood. Mr. Hazell drives off in disgrace, his fancy car and shooting party both ruined. Danny is hailed as "the champion of the world" by his father, Doc Spencer, and Sgt. Samways, but their victory is a bittersweet one, due to the fact that all the pheasants flew away. But Doc Spencer shows them six pheasants who have died from eating too many drugged raisins. They each receive two pheasants, except the Doc, who didn't want any. Danny and his father walk off toward town, intending to buy a new oven for cooking their pheasants. As they stroll along, Danny muses about how fortunate he is to have a father who is so imaginative and fun to be with.