Drawing heavily on original material – letters, diaries, official papers – Simon Heffer's hugely ambitious new book follows Britain's path from the day the fatal shots were fired at Sarajevo in June 1914 to the moment the guns finally fell silent on 11 November 1918.

Simon painstakingly examines the increasingly frantic conversations between Whitehall and Britain's embassies across Europe. He explains how a government so keen to avoid conflict found itself not only championing it but seeking to transform the country to fight it – and how, in the process, Britain was irrevocably changed.

Join Chorleywood Bookshop and Simon Heffer to celebrate his insightful and fascinating new book 'Staring at God: Britain in the First World War'! A marvellous night for history lovers and novices alike.