Blood Will Flow

‘Breathtaking‘ — Jon Lee Anderson, journalist and author of Che Guevara and The Fall of Baghdad
‘A magnificent, earth-shaking achievement’ — Andrew Harding, author of A Small Stubborn Town
‘Vital’ — Sally Hayden, author of My Fourth Time, We Drowned
‘Powerful, gripping and rigorously researched’ — Jason Burke, author of The Revolutionists
‘[A] page-turner of a book’ — Financial Times

On March 24, 2021, in the remote north of Mozambique, 500 ISIS militants attacked the small, paradise beach town of Palma – strategically unimportant but for vast offshore gas fields that had attracted $50 billion in foreign investment, including over £1 billion from the British government.

As the Islamists surged through town beheading civilians, a group of men, women and children – including 80 gas plant construction workers – barricaded themselves inside a hotel to await rescue. An oil and gas compound defended by attack helicopters and 1,000 soldiers was just minutes away. But help never came.

Five years on, Alex Perry’s spell-binding, meticulous reconstruction unearths a hidden and unprecedented fiasco. Woven into his account is a search for the truth about how energy companies really make their vast profits.

His investigation takes him around the world, from Europe to the US, and back to Africa again, as he tracks down the roughnecks, mercenaries, billionaires, and corporate spooks who can shed light on our most essential industry. As the revelations build and the lies multiply, Perry finds himself drawn into a legal drama, and an exploding political scandal.