Our August Author: Zoe Ferraris

Zoe Ferraris, author of Finding Nouf, a mystery set in Saudi Arabia, has her own website where you should be sure to check out the Q&A. She also has a blog, Pilgrimage, that will probably get more interesting when she has more than one post (although that first one is pretty good). Matt Beynon Rees (a possible future Rights Readers author) has an interview focusing mostly on the writing and publishing process while KUCI has a good audio interview.

For a little of the Saudi atmosphere, check out this National Geograhic photo gallery .

For human rights background, here is Amnesty International's Saudi Arabia page with additional commentary on the Human Rights Now blog. Even more on topic, check out this Human Rights Watch report: Saudi Arabia: Male Guardianship Policies Harm Women.

For August: Finding Nouf by Zoe Ferraris

For August, we have selected Finding Nouf by Zoe Ferraris,

When sixteen-year-old Nouf goes missing, her prominent family calls on Nayir al-Sharqi, a pious desert guide, to lead the search party. Ten days later, just as Nayir is about to give up in frustration, her body is discovered by anonymous desert travelers. But when the coroner’s office determines that Nouf died not of dehydration but from drowning, and her family seems suspiciously uninterested in getting at the truth, Nayir takes it upon himself to find out what really happened. He quickly realizes that if he wants to gain access to the hidden world of women, he will have to join forces with Katya Hijazi, a lab worker at the coroner’s office who is bold enough to bare her face and to work in public. Their partnership challenges Nayir, as he confronts his desire for female companionship and the limitations imposed by his beliefs. Fast-paced and utterly transporting, Finding Nouf is a riveting literary mystery that offers an unprecedented window into Saudi Arabia and the lives of men and women there.