Samuel Peter Shaws drama of love and betrayal is peopled by the Sink Set, a group of fickle, moneyed sophisticates living in London's leafy southern suburbs. For all but one of them, the Iraq War is sobering but coincidental, a backdrop against which they shrug and carry on. Colly Wolfson, a member of the Set, is a forty-something prize-winning architect and builder; wealthy, debonair, popular. But personal tragedy strikes him twice.
Overcome by grief and guilt, he tries to make amends, but keeps his efforts secret. For a time, he believes he might achieve a new beginning. But in 2003 on the anniversary of his own tragedies he is horrified by the numbing, hi-tech bombing of Baghdad. It leaves him isolated among his uncaring friends and it unhinges him.
Increasingly unhappy and with his marriage crumbling, he drifts into two affairs and the downward spiral begins.
While They Were Dying is the story of a man falling apart and of the efforts of his family and friends to save him; a story of love and devotion, betrayal and deception.
And all the while, among the laughter and the tears, is Colly's ever-present obsession with the monster in the corner the Iraq War of Bush and Blair.
