Pete Allman wakes up one morning to find that Britain has been at war for eighteen long months, bombs rain down on her cities, there's fierce conflict up at the front line. But where are these battlefields and, more importantly, who is the enemy...?
Bloody War. Always on the news, from somewhere
around the world. War seems to be something humanity just cannot get
out of its system. And yet, for most of us here in the UK, war is
little more than a spectacle where we sit comfortably, tut-tutting over
horrors taking place in far off and unknown lands, before returning to
our grumbles about the spending cuts or immigration or whatever else it
is that sets you off. That’s as far as it goes, save maybe for memories and stories of the dark days of WWII. But just suppose that all-out
war was to come to Great Britain again? War where fire and death rain
down from the skies again and where cities are reduced to corpse-strewn
rubble? War against the ghosts of an unknown assailant and where
patriotic media-induced insanity takes over our entire consciousness.
Just remember how the Falklands War gave us a “Gotcha!” as the Belgrano
sank, or how Gulf War Two hung upon a certain dodgy weapons dossier,
before you get too comfy on your sofa.
This dark, bloody and very British
apocalyptic novel explores just this idea, and with terrifying
plausibility. Simultaneously a thrilling page-turner and a tough and
painful read filled with horrifically recognizable imagery and
characters, this book paints a picture of England at war with an unknown assailant and the dark and dirty depths that lurk behind that. But
this is no mere rehash of WWII madness. This war is modern –
contemporary. War in the age of stealth fighter drones and advanced
surveillance technology. War in the age of media paranoia and modern
conspiracy theory.
Imagine George Orwell’s 1984 updated for 2011, with the focus on family, character and relationships
rather than political ideology, and you might have the measure of Bloody War. This book, like our society, is one where politics has become an
opaque and distant game, and where most people can see no further than
their own living rooms. If we are not careful then the price for such
false comfort, Terry Grimwood seems to suggest, may one day be terrible
indeed.
