At the dawn of the Courtney Saga, we find ourselves in 1665, scudding the seas of West Africa among the legalised piracy and legitimised carnage of the Anglo-Dutch War. For those with the guts, the rewards could be great – but the risks were high, and the price of failure often paid in blood.

Twin brothers Sean and Garrick are inseparable until the British conflict with the Zulu drives them apart, and changes their lives forever. When Sean goes missing in the massacre at the Battle of Isandlwana, Garrick presumes him dead and marries his pregnant girlfriend Anna, a decision that drives a greater stake between the brothers than any war could.

As Europe burns in the furnace of the First World War, Courtney family scion and fighter pilot Michael is heroically killed in action. His new bride Centaine flees to her late husband's homeland of South Africa, but when her ship is torpedoed, she finds herself shipwrecked, alone – and put to the ultimate test of survival.

The Skeleton Coast is a bleak desert fringing Namibia, once well known for shipwrecks, today a graveyard of thousands of whale bones. Explore the reality of the eerie landscape where Centaine de Courtney made land.

Follow Wilbur’s adventure as young man working on a Skeleton Coast trawler–the inspiration for The Burning Shore, and quite a tale in its own right.