“Raven” by author Paul Leatherdale and published by Leathers Press is the story of four teenage boys growing up in the Suffolk countryside who enlist to fight in the First World War. They are all under age and around 15 at the time they join the army and the Suffolk Regiment.

One of the boys falls in love with an enchantingly beautiful, blue-eyed, dark-haired, local, young girl of the same age before going off to war, but she is clearly not of this world and has a supernatural secret. The raven is her companion, a mysterious, red-eyed bird who accompanies her wherever she goes. The bird is powerful and strong and highly intelligent and has endured across the ages.

The book explores the innocence of growing up in rural Suffolk at the turn of the 20th century and the rapid journey of the boys into adulthood, as a result of their horrific experiences fighting in the trenches of the First World War.

Binding the whole story together is the mysterious raven, an immortal, who influences the lives of those she touches. Who is she and how does she sustain her existence, and who must pay the price?