Around the time of the Cuban missile crisis, British expatriates are detained by the administration of a newly-independent West African country which is under intense Soviet influence. They are told that they are being detained to maintain the country's essential services until such time as indigenous personnel are sufficiently trained to take over. They escape to a supposedly neutral country, to learn that this country has recently and secretly signed a unification pact with the nation from which they have just fled. They elude their new captors, losing two of their members in violent circumstances, and are forced, totally unprepared, into the jungle, before finding refuge in a remote Catholic Mission. With their pursuers closing in on them, they are forced to flee back into the rain forest, and eventually reach a friendly French territory, and, finally, their homeland. A. Stephen Rutter was born and educated in England, and first saw human conflict in Egypt and Cyprus while serving with the British Army. He then spent several years working as a sales and marketing manager for one of Britain's leading merchant companies in Nigeria during the late fifties and early sixties, when Africa was beginning to emerge from a century of European rule. This is his first full length novel, and although totally a work of fiction, it is based on his experiences and first-hand observations while in West Africa. Previous publications include articles in local newspapers and magazines, and broadcasts on national radio. He now resides in British Columbia, Canada.