The Cartographer of No Man's Land - Softcover

An addition to the literary canon of World War I... Turning the final page, I wanted to go back to the beginning, if only to contemplate a writer who has such a broad and compassionate understanding of the human condition.
--Frances Itani, The Washington Post

Duffy's vivid descriptions illuminate war's transformative effect in fresh ways. Well nuanced characters and carefully choreographed (but still surprising) situations make this a strong debut.
--Publishers Weekly

Subject matter does not come much bleaker than the First World War and debut novelist P.S. Duffy tackles it with confidence.
--Antonia Senior, The Times

Trust me. I know where I m going.

Angus MacGrath, artist, sailor and navigator, is lost caught between a remote wife, a disapproving father and a son seeking guidance. Far from his coastal village in Nova Scotia, war rages in Europe, and among the missing is Angus s adventurous brother-in-law whose unknown fate sets Angus on an uncharted course, with profound consequences for those he loves and those he comes to love.

Angus defies his pacifist upbringing and enlists to find his wife s brother. Though assured a safe job as a military cartographer in London, he is assigned instead to the infantry to the blood-soaked mud of France, where his search begins. At home his young son, once wide-eyed about the war, must navigate uncertain loyalties in a village succumbing to war fever.

Separated by the ocean they once sailed together, Angus and his son search for what it takes to survive, each trying in his own way to return to the other. Every character in this exquisitely told story seeks to protect what matters most in the face of war s upheaval.