In this sparkling fiction debut this keleidoscope of nations, cultures and political ambitions shifts and re-forms around a group of English men and women, blown here by many different winds. Welcome to a world of perilous ascents - and abrupt descents - from military kite balloons; of madcap journeys by mule, by Wolseley motor car and by foot over the grim northern mountains, where the opposing armies are locked in combat; of U-boats lurking off the city; of sinister and dangerous Gazmend Effendi, who may be Turkish - or is it Bulgarian? Or even Venezuelan? And where is all the petrol disappearing to? The breathless ride is just beginning.