Pride and Prejudice in the Arabian Gulf?

For most people, being a single mother to three boys (two of them teenagers), sorting out your feelings for an ex-boyfriend who's now an international film star, pacifying an elderly father who keeps asking why you're not married, tolerating your bigoted brother, while keeping out of the way of a dismissive film producer who seems to have made a mission out of annoying you, would be quite enough of a challenge.

Annie Lester is not only trying to tackle all this - she's also doing it in the small Gulf emirate of Hawar where, in the summer of 2002, the impact of America's decision to invade Iraq is just beginning to be felt.

The Gulf Between Us is a deliciously written novel about disappointment, hope and surviving in a world of conflicting values by the author of The Handmade House and Observer journalist Geraldine Bedell.

'Politics and passion make for combustion in this acutely observed and often very funny novel' The Times

'Geraldine Bedell invites us straight into the beating heart of family life . . . a delicious novel' Meg Rosoff

Praise for The Handmade House

'A warm, funny, satisfying book' India Knight