It is 1940 and the shores of southern England have been mined against Hitler's expected invasion. Young Septimus, running away from home, where he has just heard that his brother has been shot down, stumbles along these shores only to find himself part of a desperate, high-powered world he does not understand but cannot escape. His encounter with a much storied man long believed dead - but certainly no ghost - places him right in the center of the storm.Septimus is Stephen Scott's fourth novel.