In the summer of 2006 a nineteen-year-old music student returns to Beirut from London to find that her disabled younger brother has gone missing. In her frantic search for him, she becomes caught up in the deadly conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, travelling into the heart of the conflict , and, at the same time, into the depths of her own memory and conscience. Infused with a powerful sense of place, Paper Sparrows concerns itself with the fragility of normality: a dog swimming in the sea, suddenly covered in crude oil; a mother trapped in a basement looking for a nappy for her baby; a young woman whose future depends on her ability to play music, scrabbling in the ruins with her bare hands. In the midst of this chaos we watch the central character, torn between conflicting visions of the world, falling in love for the first time and trying to work out how to deal with unfamiliar emotions. A very rewarding read.