BURMA BOY

A few months ago fourteen-year-old Ali Banana was apprenticed to awhip-wielding blacksmith in his rural hometown. Now its winter 1944, thewar is entering its most crucial stage and Ali is a private in ThunderBrigade. His unit has been given orders to go behind enemy lines and wreakhavoc. But the Burmese jungle is a mud-riven, treacherous place, riddledwith Japanese snipers, insanity and disease. "Burma Boy" is a horrific,vividly realised account of the madness, the sacrifice and the dark humourof the Second World War's most vicious battleground. It's also the movingstory of a boy trying to live long enough to become a man.