Follow Major Daniel Byrne on his journey both through the trenches and upwards through the ranks of the British Army as he leads his fearless band of ‘Knaves', formed as a crack special unit made up of childhood friends from the mining towns of the north east of England. AAG Whitehead's Pals War: the Battle of Loos is a personal insight into life on the frontline of the First World War, centred on a group of young men who grew up together and now form a unique and elite band of fighters tasked with covert operations and intelligence gathering on the frontline during 1915.The Battle of Loos is not a book of deliberately graphic detail but a more touching and intimate account, a study of one man's experience which fully evokes the camaraderie of this group of men, although the horror of the war is never far away. The book also offers a fascinating portrait of the life of ordinary French people behind the lines and their interaction with the British soldiers, which contrasts dramatically with the carnage of the frontline. A none too predictable tale for this subject matter, The Battle of Loos is both different and captivating.