Shoulder the Sky

It is April 1915 and the world is in the bloody throws of a war the soldiers had once hoped would be over by last Christmas. Now, in the rat-infested trenches on the Western Front at Ypres, nobody knows when the horror will end - and nine-tenths of the British Expeditionary Force are already dead. Back in England, meanwhile, spring is in the air and most civilians have little idea of what their soldiers at the Front are enduring. Seeking to broadcast the truth, a young war correspondent for The Times called Eldon Prentice is gathering material to write a series of shockingly candid pieces. But then he is found dead in no-man’s land – and it seems that the Germans are not responsible. For Joseph Reavley, now acting as Chaplain at the Front, the event has uncomfortable echoes of his own parents’ tragedy: the deaths are undeniably linked. Murder and censorship are the dark weapons being secretly employed behind the lines – but by whom, and what will the final cost be at this time of national crisis?