Lost lives : the stories of the men, women and children who died as a result of the Northern Ireland troubles

This volume is filled with passion and violence, with humanity and inhumanity.

It is the story of the Northern Ireland troubles; it is not concerned with political bickering but with the lives of those who have suffered and the deaths which have resulted from more than three decades of conflict.

The authors - three of them Belfast-born and the fourth an American - are journalists.

Over a seven-year period they examined every death which was directly caused by the troubles.

Their research involved interviewing witnesses, scouring published material and drawing on a range of investigative sources to produce this study.

The book traces the origins of the conflict from the firing of the first shots, through the carnage of the 1970s and 1980s and up to the republican and loyalist ceasefires and beyond.

All the casualties are here: the RUC officer, the young soldier, the IRA volunteer, the loyalist paramilitary, the Catholic mother, the Protestant worker, the new-born baby.