Daniel Landerville’s roots are embedded deep in the red earth of the Australian outback. It is a time when Empire is paramount and many Australians, even native-born ones, think of England as ‘home’. His boyhood affinity for horses becomes both his business and his passion.
When the clouds of the Great War gather over Europe, Australian soldiers need mounts, lots of mounts, and the army turns to men like Daniel. Like many others, a sense of patriotic fervour and naive adventurism entices him to leave home and family in answer to his country’s call. When Empire demands it, he becomes a horsemaster of the Australian Light Horse.
His sense of adventure is soon quenched once he experiences the trench warfare horrors of Gallipoli. When he is invalided home after the great Light Horse charge at Beersheba, his wounds are not just physical. Melancholy and regret threatens to overwhelm him, until he finally realises that he has unfinished business in turbulent post war Ottoman Turkey that he must resolve, if he is to ever find peace.
