A STORY OF UNSUNG BRAVERY AT A DEFINING MOMENT IN BRITAIN'S HISTORY'Superb' Stephen Fry'Thrillingly told' Dan Jones'Fascinating' Neil MacGregor'Astonishing' Peter FrankopanWe like to think we know the story of how Britain went to war with Germany in 1939, but there is one chapter that has never been told. In the early 1930s, a group of young, queer British MPs visited Berlin on a series of trips that would change the course of the Second World War. Having witnessed the Nazis' brutality first-hand, these men were some of the first to warn Britain about Hitler, repeatedly speaking out against their government's policy of appeasing him. Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain hated them. Branding them 'the glamour boys' to insinuate something untoward about them, he had their phones tapped and threatened them with deselection and exposure. At a time when even the suggestion of homosexuality could land you in prison, the bravery these men were forced to show in their personal lives gave them extraordinary courage in public. Undaunted, they refused to be silenced and when war came, they enlisted. Four of them died in action. And without them, Britain would never have faced down the Nazis.A Guardian Book of Autumn 2020

In the middle of the Spanish-American War in 1898, sea pilot Peter Long receives a mysterious request for his services. He is asked to guide a three-masted coasting schooner to the mouth of the Atlantic Ocean. But the ship's master is none other than Ebenezer Soule, Long's rival from their apprentice days aboard the pilot schooner Tunnell. A pacifist Quaker sympathizer, Soule was ousted from the sea pilot service for his activist ways. Despite past rivalries, including competition for the love of a wealthy Quaker ship owner's daughter, Long still views Soule as his hero. However, the Tunnell's crew suspects Soule is a traitor and that Cuba is the schooner's true destination. When Spanish voices are heard in a locked part of the ship's hold, mutiny appears imminent. What unfolds is a story of friendship, competition, and conflict in which Long must look past old feelings and decide where his true loyalties lie.