CORRESPONDENTS

This fast-moving novel about war correspondents in the aftermath of the Iraq War follows the stories of Rita Khoury, an American-Irish-Lebanese journalist caught up in the middle eastern conflict, and her interpreter Nabil al-Jumaili, a young Muslim gay man whose career and family life are agonisingly impacted by the secret of his sexuality. We meet Rita in America in 2008 as she drives with her Jewish boyfriend Jonah to introduce him to her family at the mahrajan, the annual festival of the Lebanese Maronite community, where Rita is reunited with her mother Mary-Jo and her much-loved cousin Bobby, at the centre of the dancing with his prosthetic leg. The story then backtracks to her mother's generation, where Mary-Jo Coughlin wants to be a doctor but is directed into nursing college. Soon her tutor, George Khoury, notices that she has acquired a doctor's knowledge and invites her to be his business partner and then his wife. There are surprises in store for Mary-Jo as she has to fight off her mother-in-law's expectations and realises that George wants his daughters to reach the highest pinnacle of their careers. Rita gives every sign of fulfilling her father's ambitions but then life gets complicated as she meets Muslim girls like Yasmin who are at the centre of the struggle for women's freedoms. Meanwhile Nabil is experiencing the traumas of the Saddam years and wonders with his fellow-citizens whether an American surgical incision could possibly rid the country of its brutal dictatorship while leaving ordinary citizens in peace. The stage is set for an agonising clash of cultures. 440pp.