When the diffident and ineffectual Derek Mann loses his teaching job in a girls' grammar school in England and drifts from one temporary post to another, one of his precocious pupils gives him her grandfather's wartime diary with a mission to return to Apartheid South Africa and find the opal mine she believes to be her rightful inheritance. Intrigue and violence bedevil the quest that ends in a desert under the Southern Cross. The wry, often laconic style gives full reign to the characters' latent sexuality. While the novel takes the form of a thriller, it is also a love story. The plot pivots round the war-diary of a man whose bomber was shot down in action in Egypt in 1941. The man had invested money in partnership with his wartime friend in an opal mine in a place designated by the letters 'C.P.' in 'S.A.'. His granddaughter's search for the mine affects her own as well as her former teacher's destiny.

Book Information
ISBN 9780244983475
Author Charles Muller
Format Paperback
Page Count 582
Imprint Lulu.com
Publisher Lulu.com
Weight(grams) 844g