The Tin Soldiers

Raphael Undu is 13 years old, a farmer’s son in Congo’s rebellious, mineral-rich east. When war scatters his family, he must protect his little sister, Keisha, and try to reunite them. He is a tough and resourceful boy, but ranged against him are rebels and a renegade army, vying for control of mineral wealth beyond imagination.

While Raphael’s personal crisis spirals out of control, photographer James Falkus follows clues to the Congo, hoping to piece together the puzzle surrounding his birth parents. James, however, is opening a Pandora’s box, with devastating and far-reaching consequences for everyone around him.

All the while, the lives of ordinary people are being manipulated by powerful national and global forces locked in a struggle for control of the country and its natural riches, and playing a high-stakes poker game for global influence. Only one thing is certain—nothing and no one here are what they seem.