An ice-cream war

'We will all melt like ice-cream in the sun!' – British soldier, East Africa, October 1914As millions were slaughtered on the Western Front, a ridiculous and little-reported campaign was waged in East Africa – a war they continued after the Armistice because no one told them to stop.Primarily a gripping story of the men and women swept up by the passions of love and battle, William Boyd's magnificently entertaining novel also elicits the cruel futility and tragedy of it all.'As ambitious as it is remarkable – balances on seesaws of innocence and violence, sanity and lunacy, hilarity and horror' – The Times'He has a black-edged laughter of his own – quite outstanding' – Claire Tomalin in the Sunday Times'Funny, assured and expansively told, a seriocomic romp. But it's also something maturely more – a study of people caught in the side pockets of calamity that dramatizes their plights with humour, detail and grit' – Harper's