After Friday prayers an anonymous young woman from Riyadh sends stories via email to a list of subscribers to her online list-serv. Over the course of a year our narrator shares the triumphs and tragedies of four friends - Gamrah, Michelle, Sadeem and Lamees. Gamrah is the first to succeed in securing love in a traditionally arranged Saudi marriage. Michelle, whose mother is American, is the rebel in the group and will seek love on her own. Sadeem struggles when she loses her father and mother and thus has no one to arrange a suitable marriage. Lamees is the academic in the group and pursues a successful medical career. Originally published in Arabic in 2005, Alsanea's first novel took the Arab world by storm, stoking controversy and igniting debate about the role of young women in the traditional Islamic countries such as Saudi Arabia.
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