John Boyne's ninth novel, The Absolutist, begins in September 1919 on a train bound for Norwich. Tristan Sadler, the book's heavy-hearted narrator, is on his way to meet the family of Will Bancroft, one of the many young men who perished on the soggy fields of northern France in the First World War.
Three and a half years earlier, Sadler and Bancroft had formed a powerful friendship in the military barracks of southern England where the two arrived "stinking of sweat and bogus heroism" as malleable young recruits. Shortly afterwards, they are transported with almost unseemly haste to the trenches, where their friendship withers.
Boyne's pages trace Sadler's movement from naive newcomer to battle-scarred veteran and Bancroft's equally uneasy journey from trainee to traitor. This is, however, the slimmest description of an engaging novel. This beautifully paced work breathes new life into an old conflict, lighting slow fuses and raising questions at every turn. What is evident early on is the high cost a generation paid to win the war to end all wars. What remains obscured until the book's dramatic conclusion is the bitterness of that price.
