While They Were Dying: The Road to Iraq

Samuel Peter Shaw’s drama of love and betrayal is peopled by the Sink Set, a group of fickle, moneyed sophisticates living in London's leafy southern suburbs. For all but one of them, the Iraq War is sobering but coincidental, a backdrop against which they shrug and carry on. Colly Wolfson, a member of the Set, is a forty-something prize-winning architect and builder; wealthy, debonair, popular. But personal tragedy strikes him twice.

Overcome by grief and guilt, he tries to make amends, but keeps his efforts secret. For a time, he believes he might achieve a new beginning. But in 2003 – on the anniversary of his own tragedies – he is horrified by the numbing, hi-tech bombing of Baghdad. It leaves him isolated among his uncaring friends – and it unhinges him.

Increasingly unhappy and with his marriage crumbling, he drifts into two affairs – and the downward spiral begins.

“While They Were Dying” is the story of a man falling apart – and of the efforts of his family and friends to save him; a story of love and devotion, betrayal and deception.

And all the while, among the laughter and the tears, is Colly's ever-present obsession with the monster in the corner – the Iraq War of Bush and Blair.