The Afghan Campaign

Alexander the Great began his campaign in Afghanistan in the summer of 330BC. It was to last for three brutal years and would prove to be the longest and most difficult campaign he and his army ever fought. This thrilling, urgently-told novel tells the story of this bloody and ruthless conflict from the perspective of a young Macedonian recruit, Matthias - the youngest of three brothers and eager to prove himself - who volunteers to join the leader he worships on his ambitious expedition into the alien, unknown country we now call Afghanistan. But as he joins the frontlineof Alexander's army, Matthias comes to realise that the nature of warfare for which he has trained so hard has changed out of all recognition. The Macedonians now face a new kind of enemy, and must learn to fight a new kind of war. Experiencing fear, euphoria, horror and shame, Matthias and his fellow foot soldiers must undergo a rite of passage as they - soldiers of a Western civilisation whose code is basically secular and humanist - seek to impose their will upon a fiercely proud and ruthless warrior nation of the East with deeply-held beliefs, insularity, tribalism and unswerving adherence to the notion