The motto of the boarding school to which eight-year-old Tommy Bedford is dispatched is 'Fortune Favours the Brave'. It's England in 1959 and the school bristles with bullies and sadistic staff. Tommy, a quirky loner, obsessed with Cowboys and Indians, will need all the bravery he can summon - and not simply to cope with school. Everything at home is suddenly turned upside down when he learns that his sister Diane, a glamorous actress, is in fact his mother and that his elderly parents are really his grandparents.

When Diane finds fame and falls in love with one of Tommy's heroes, TV cowboy star Ray Montane, she snatches him from school and whisks him away to live with them in Hollywood. Suddenly all Tommy's fantasies seem to have come true. With a handsome new president promising a New Frontier, the world seems golden and full of promise. But as the Cold War casts its shadow, the sinister side of Tinseltown starts to show through. When scandal erupts, Diane and Tommy are forced to flee to Montana. There, Tommy learns about the natural world and the cruel truth of how the West was won. He also has to learn at last the true meaning of bravery.

Unmasking the brutal reality behind the macho cowboy myth and how that myth affects the world today, THE BRAVE explores our quest for love and identity, the fallibility both of heroes and of parents, and the devastating effects of family secrets.