On 20 July 1944; Adolf Hitler narrowly escaped an assassin's bomb. Axel von Gottberg and his conspirators were hunted down and hanged from meat-hooks; and the executions filmed. Sixty years later; Conrad Senior is left a legacy of papers by von Gottberg's close friend; the legendary Oxford professor Elya Mendel; and becomes obsessed with what they reveal and finding the brutal film. Award-winning writer Justin Cartwright has conjured a masterwork that addresses the nature of friendship and what it means to be human; and it is a remarkable tapestry of passion; ideas; frailty and courage.