The author, who hails from Scotland, spent many hours listening to her mother-in-law recount, in vivid detail, memories of her childhood days in the tiny village of Patrick, in the Isle of Man, during the First World War. As Lou talked, the author realised she was listening to history, a lot of which no one else could tell, and that if Lou were to die, all that history would be lost forever. So she wrote it all down and turned it into Hedge of Thorns.
In those days the village was dwarfed by the huge internment camp at Knockaloe, created for the accommodation of thousands of men classed as enemy aliens. Men whose only crimes were to have German, Austrian or Turkish origins.
Hedge of Thorns is a true account of the impact that the Great War and the monster of Knockaloe camp had on the lives of a Manx family which still followed the traditional crofting way of life. It is a most moving and memorable story of the stresses and strains which shattered the peaceful existence of a family whose loved ones were caught up in the emergencies of war.
Throughout Europe, during those dreadful war-torn years, millions of families were suffering similar deprivation, fear, loss and heartbreak.
Millions died in most dreadful ways and millions more eventually returned home crippled in either body or mind. Or both!
It was to be the war to end all wars, for no one could imagine such stupidity happening again but–!