Victoria's World War I soldiers, nurses and their families are commemorated in stories from the home front and battlefront. Victoria at War records the achievements of these Victorians - including the Whitelaws from Gippsland with six sons enlisting, 'Bert' Jacka, the first Australian to be awarded the Victoria Cross in World War I, and commander Sir John Monash. Bestselling historian Michael McKernan tells the stories that highlight the generosity, devotion, sacrifice and spirit of a community pushed towards breaking point.

A tour de force about the impact of war on one family over the twentieth century. Working at the Australian War Memorial for many years, Michael McKernan had heard and written about many stories of war. For him, war was never about the big picture; it always came down to the individual. Yet little did he know when he met his future wife in 1989 that her father would soon be telling him, over many leisurely afternoons, his own story, of being made a slave to the Nazis in the Second World War, and its unforeseeable consequences. One of these consequences was that Mychajlo Stawyskyj's son Joe would grow up in Australia in time to be sent to fight in Vietnam, where he would become one of that war's worst casualties. Drawing on his authoritative grasp of twentieth-century history, and in particular military and social history, Michael McKernan pieces together the disrupted lives of his father-in-law and brother-in-law, creating a compelling narrative of general interest, as well as an unforgettable story about the cost of war to one Australian family.