The Deadly Playground 1914: The Barrington Quintet Volume 1

by Robert Carter

Overview

The year is 1912. Two Oxford men are members of the same college, but they could not be more different. The first, Stanley Walker, son of a shopkeeper, is studying engineering. The second, Jimmy Barrington, son of Britain's wealthiest banker, owns a fast car. They become friends. Jimmy's birthday picnic at Port Meadow turns into a grand gathering, attended by the cream of London society, who sip champagne served by the family's butler and enjoy the late summer sunshine. Stanley is introduced to Theda, Jimmy's headstrong sister, and the other members of the Barrington clan. None of them knows - though some suspect - that their world is about to change forever. When war breaks out, Jimmy decides to join the Royal Flying Corps, and he persuades Stanley Walker to come with him. Soon they are embroiled in a new kind of war which starts with the German invasion of Belgium. Not all goes according to plan, however, and while Stanley sticks to his guns, Jimmy's fate takes a turn that leads him to an even stranger battlefield. The Deadly Playground is the first volume of a series that recounts the story of the prestigious Barrington family during the Great War. A tale of espionage, romance and a portrait of power and influence moving behind the scenes as the curtain rises on the first act of a Century of tumultuous conflict. Hallmarked by attention to historical detail, this novel comes with a guarantee - that the reader will find a story that will make him or her regard the Great War in a completely new light. It is unlike any other story that has been told.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781499552478
Publisher:	CreateSpace Publishing
Publication date:	05/31/2014
Series:	The Barrington Quintet , #1
Pages:	274
Product dimensions:	5.98(w) x 9.02(h) x 0.58(d)

About the Author

As a child I lived in Sydney, Australia. I was twelve when we returned to England aboard the P&O liner Orcades. I studied Astrophysics at Newcastle University. I loved Newcastle from the moment I arrived. I loved the university, loved the city and I especially loved the Geordies. I was reading a lot of science fiction - and began to write my own stories and launched the university's first science fiction society.

After that I worked in oil industry in the USA, and was posted to parts of the Middle East and the war-torn heart of Africa. It was both dangerous and well-paid. More than once I came close to being killed - and plenty of good men I knew never came home. I went to remote places like the Rub al Khali and the Congo, and I saw things most people don't see, or ever want to.

In my 20's I travelled to East Berlin and Warsaw, then to Moscow and Leningrad. I took the Trans-Siberian railway to Japan. I worked in Hong Kong and entered China proper as part of a project to develop that country's communications. I took tea with the heir of the last king of Upper Burma near Mandalay, and on the road to Everest base camp I just happened to run into Sir Edmund Hillary. After travelling around most of India, Sri Lanka and Indonesia , I returned home and got a job with the BBC. Four years later, I left the BBC to write.