When I set out to write Spin Zhira my benchmarks were An Ordinary Soldier by Doug Beattie MC, The Junior Officers’ Reading Club by Patrick Hennessey, Losing Small Wars by Frank Ledwidge and The Killing Zone by Richard Dorney.

I read many books as I prepared for deployment to Afghanistan, but these four stood head and shoulders above the rest.

Consequently, I’m enormously proud that the authors have so positively reviewed my attempts to emulate them.

Here’s what they said:

‘Brims with authenticity and dark humour.’

Patrick Hennessey, The Junior Officers’ Reading Club

‘The best book by a soldier concerning the Afghan War that I have read.’

Frank Ledwidge, Losing Small Wars

‘A must read.’

Richard Dorney, The Killing Zone

‘First Class.’

Doug Beattie, An Ordinary Soldier

Follow the link to read the full reviews.

A true story of love, service and incompetence.

Chris Green had it all. 

But when Chris became disillusioned with this seemingly perfect existence he didn’t:

Instead he went to fight the increasingly unpopular war on terror in Afghanistan.

In the process of discovering himself he unwittingly discovers that the courage and heroism of the soldiers he fights alongside are confounded by incompetence and corruption, not to mention “an industrial strength counterterrorism killing machine”.

It’s a world where the dipsomaniac governor is in the pay of the illicit opium trade, the Chief of Police is a pederast and all round bad guy and the locals still haven’t forgiven the British for the occupation of 1842, or for the Russian Invasion of 1979. All infidels look the same so you can’t really tell them apart.

Missing his two young sons, unable to influence policy and just a phone-call away from a brawl he can only lose with the elite SAS, Chris dreams of epic powder days in the High Alps a world away from Afghanistan. But before he can return home to a hero’s welcome – and his wife’s divorce lawyers – he must first complete one last mission to Zumbalay, the Taliban Heart of Darkness and an unlikely reunion with an old man in Helmand.

Spin Zhira is a rare insight into the male mid-life crisis. What every woman needs to know and why every man should be careful what he wishes for.

Ten reasons to read Spin Zhira.