Book Log 2013 #1: Finding Nouf by Zoe Ferraris

So I hadn't realized that I'd not started this year's book log until I was browsing entries looking for comment spam. I can't say I got any emails, Facebook messages or other communications pleading for its return, but here it is.

In this novel, a teenaged girl goes missing in the Saudi Arabian desert, and its up to the family's desert guide to find her.  Her body is eventually found by others, and when the autopsy turns up some surprising revelations, they ask him to investigate the death. The only way he can effectively do this, though, is to enlist the help of a female worker at the coroner's office, who also happens to be the fiancee of one of the girl's adoptive brothers.

Ferrais lived in Saudi Arabia for a time and was married into a Saudi-Palestinian family, and her first hand experience with the culture helps to support an already well-conceived mystery. And for all of the display of this traditional culture, there's all of the characters who are living out of synch with it, from the desert guide (a devout Muslim from Palestine rather than a Bedouin) to the lab tech (whose mother was Russian) to the family at the center of the mystery, with its adoptive sons and the daughters (and daughters in  law) who both fight for place in the family hierarchy and, in some cases, long for a freer life. While I don't expect the people in this book mirror the author's experience exactly, there's certainly a "write what you know" vibe.

This is the first book in a series of mysteries featuring Katya, the lab tech with the Russian mother. Probably a good idea to read them in order, and it's worth a go. I really enjoyed this book.