About this Book

"What would happen, I wonder, if the Armies suddenly and simultaneously
went on strike and said some other method must be found of settling the
dispute?"
--Winston Churchill, November 1914

This much, at least, is true: In December of
1914, soldiers along the battlefront laid down their arms and observed a
Christmastime truce. That much is true. They buried their dead, sang
and drank together, roasted pigs and rabbits they had caught, and had
bicycle races.

And there was more than one football game.

The
first part of The Christmas Mutiny is as close as I can manage to what
really happened, allowing for dramatic license. I wanted to have a
diverse cast of young characters, so I allowed an American pilot to be
forced down near the front, a Turkish observer to be present among the
Germans, and so on – they weren’t there, but they could have been.

The
second part of the book is something very different. It tells a story
of what might have happened. It’s not the only way things might have
happened, and maybe I’m wrong and it couldn’t possibly have happened the
way I describe. You may certainly feel free to disagree. If you feel so
strongly that you want to write your own version, I’d be very happy to
read it.