A chain of events is started when, in 1943 on Bougainville Island, New Guinea, a Japanese officer beheads Hugh Rand, an Australian spy ― a coast watcher. The spectators include villagers Rand terrorised as his mind frayed under the stress of pursuit by Japanese soldiers and their hounds. Rand's influence transcends his death. For decades he plagues those who strive to cope with him and one another in New Guinea, the Gilbert Islands, Australia and Japan. The layers unfold through cultural, historical and intellectual curtains, deep into minds disturbed by the Pacific war and Hugh Rand’s legacy.

Death of a Coast Watcher is interwoven with themes of obsession, betrayal, heroism and cowardice. As the editor described it: "It involves people losing one's head ― both literally and figuratively." Struck by this powerful image and with the core of the story suggesting a bodiless head, our cover cooks created a design in which the color scheme, typography and composition hinted to the historic-cultural context of the event, borrowing the detached head from a tribal mud mask in New Guinea. The geometric sans serif typography combines with red and beige in a nod to WWII-era Japanese propaganda posters.