Damian Barr is the author of the critically acclaimed Maggie & Me, a memoir about coming of age in Thatcher's Britain.
He has now written his first novel, You Will Be Safe Here, which is set in South Africa during two time periods, the Second Boer War in 1901 and a training camp in 2010.
The book was partly inspired by a newspaper photograph Damian saw of a boy who had been sent by his mother to a training camp run by former soldiers in 2011, which aimed to "make men out of boys".
He was tortured, beaten and starved, and eventually died.
Britain's involvement in the Boer Wars is something Damian feels many are unaware of.
"I think the fact that it remains a hidden history adds a layer of indignity to the shame that people feel when they discover what Britain did in South Africa in 1899-1902, which is that we invented the concentration camp."
During this time 33,000 farms were burned, which Damian says "created a homeless nation of women and children".
He joined us on The Last Word to discuss the events of the book further.
He says, "I'm not asking people to feel guilty or bad about what happened a hundred years ago."
"I'm asking them to see that this was a tragedy that we caused that is still having an effect today."
Listen to the interview in full by pressing the play button on this page.
