Austria, 1946. In a remote hunting lodge hidden deep in the forests of a shattered Europe, two men face each other across a kitchen table. One is a fugitive Nazi. The other has come to bring him to justice. Between them lies a gun - and the ghosts of a war that refuses to die. 
As captor and captive trade stories, truth and deceit entwine. Their recollections span a continent in flames: from the Blitz that tore through a British city to the brutal siege of Monte Cassino; from the frozen hell of the Eastern Front to the chaos of a death march. Loyalties and lives were tested to breaking point.
Across this epic story there is much that is not as it seems. As the day draws on, hidden identities, a forbidden love and long-buried betrayals surface - until some players in this tense drama must reckon with not only their foe, but also themselves. By the time evening approaches and the world slides into the shadow of the Cold War, one question remains: in a landscape where so many souls are stained by conflict, is anyone entirely guilt free? 
Martin's Eyes is an enthralling historical thriller of conscience and survival - where the line between hero and villain is sometimes blurred by the ashes of war.

Iain Ballantyne’s debut novel Martin’s Eyes is his first book for Chiselbury, inspired in part by meeting a real-life Nazi hunter while writing for the Western Morning News. He is already an acclaimed non-fiction author, with titles including the award-winning Killing the Bismarck, the ground-breaking Hunter Killers, Arnhem: Ten Days in the Cauldron, and The Deadly Trade, described by The Times as “superbly told… consistently fascinating.”

A widely travelled journalist, Iain has reported from the Arctic, the Barents Sea, Hong Kong, Kuwait, Bosnia, Berlin, Arabia, North Africa and Eastern Europe, including Russia during and after the fall of the Soviet Union. His career has ranged from defence correspondent to national news agency reporter and freelance scriptwriter.

A Fellow of the UK’s Maritime Foundation, he is Editor of the global naval magazine Warships IFR, hosts its podcast, and regularly appears on others including History Hit, Secrets and Spies, and WW2TV. Iain is represented by Peters Fraser + Dunlop.