The Bringing Down of the Hawk

A gripping family saga of love, heartache, war, crime, and retribution. The share market crash of October 1987 shook the lives of many New Zealanders-but none more profoundly than Teddy Starling, a childhood immigrant brought to those shores in 1946 in the aftermath of World War II. Teddy was just ten years old when his father, Staff Sergeant Eddie Starling, was fighting with the 18th Battalion of the Second New Zealand Expeditionary Force against the might of Erwin Rommel's armoured divisions in the North African desert.
Eddie had already survived the horrors of Dunkirk evacuation, but suffered devastating injuries in the battles that followed. Broken in body and mind, and afflicted by amnesia, he was transported to New Zealand, where a new identity-and a new life-were created for him. Over the next sixty years, a profound bond forms between father and son-one forged through devotion, resilience, and unspoken truths.
Their journey spans five continents and five decades, shaped by love, hardship, and the shadows of a hidden past. But the past does not remain buried. What emerges is a powerful, meticulously planned, and deeply personal act of retribution-one that defines the man Teddy becomes, even as he remains, in his father's eyes, forever the loyal boy.