The bestselling novel which inspired the Hollywood movie starring John Mills.They served it ice-cold in Alex - pale amber Rheingold beer in tall, dewy glasses. This is the image that haunts Captain George Anson. Stationed in the North African desert just before the fall of Tobruk, an ice-cold lager seems a million miles away. When Anson is detailed to escort two nursing sisters to Alexandria, it looks as though his wish is finally about to come true - a routine assignment, with a lager at the end of it as his reward. But what starts out as a routine journey soon becomes an epic. Forced to drive further and further south in order to escape the advancing German Army, Anson and his small party are soon on the edge of the Great Sand Sea. As they battle with the physical agonies of a six-hundred-mile drive through the desert it soon becomes apparent that each member of the group has his or her own private struggles to resolve. Not only that, but with a Nazi agent in their midst, it is clear that not all of them are going to make it to Alexandria ...