Brothers in War (Retallick series)

1915: Ben Metallic is asked by a War Office friend to provide two traction engines for a secret expedition attempting to take two gunboats overland from Cape Town to Lake Tanganyika—more than 3,000 miles—to wrest control of the lake from the Germans. He sends engines with young Ruddlemoor as the driver, who meets a Portuguese East African nurse and takes her side against a group of white racist south Africans. Meanwhile, Antonia St. Anna is influential in having Ben released, when he is arrested on circumstantial evidence provided by a business rival and accused of being pro-German. In Brothers in War, E. V. Thompson returns to his acclaimed Retallick saga, immersing the family in the upheaval of the First World War and, through them, creating a captivating tale of love and war, loyalty and betrayal, loss and adventure that weaves its way from Cornwall to the uncharted territory of the depths of Africa—and to an eventful conclusion in Cornwall once more.