Sowerbutt's Fireworks

“Blimey, Bonfire Night. What’s going on here?” The grey-haired man stared through the windscreen of the Leyland prison van. It was his second day back in uniform after retiring a couple of years earlier. Bursts of red, gold, silver and orange shot over the street, a stone’s throw from Clapham Common. To the side, bunches of crackers, tied together with rafia, snapped and fizzed as they jumped along the pavement. Bangers, stuck in drainpipes and odd holes, added to the cacophony. 
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Smoke-London-Sowerbutt-Novels-ebook-x/dp/B00RYR8BWG