What an honour it is to have received another award for my novel Song of the Nile. To date the book has won a Pinnacle Book Achievement Award, and the romance category at the 2021 American Fiction Awards, the 2021 New York City Big Book Awards and the 2022 Independent Press Awards.

Now it has been announced that Song of the Nile has been named ‘Winner’ in the Romance category of the 2022 International Book Awards.

I’m thrilled that my novel is being so well received. It’s my eighth novel, and of course I love each one I write, but this one is especially important to me because it is set in my homeland, Egypt. Land of the gods, of pharaohs, of ancient monuments that have endured for thousands of years. Of a people who are warm and kind and every bit as proud as their ancestors. A land of scorching skies and sweeping deserts and the mighty Nile, source of all life.

My novel Song of the Nile is set in 1940s Egypt, after the World War. This was a time of escapism and making hay while the sun shone – of glamour and frivolity for the aristocracy, of polo tournaments and glittering balls and picnics by the Nile. But beneath the surface, tensions lurked. Illegal trafficking. Stirrings of revolution. To be a strong, independent woman in this society was not easy, as my heroine, Aida, soon discovers. Neither, she finds, is it easy to follow your heart and trust in love…

About the book:

Luxor, 1946. When young nurse Aida El Masri returns from war-torn London to her family’s estate in Egypt she steels herself against the challenges ahead.

Eight years have passed since her father, Ayoub, was framed for a crime he did not commit, and died as a tragic result. Yet Aida has not forgotten, and now she wants revenge against the man she believes betrayed her father – his best friend, Kamel Pharaony.

Then Aida is reunited with Kamel’s son, the captivating surgeon Phares, who offers her marriage. In spite of herself, the secret passion Aida harboured for him as a young girl reignites. Still, how can she marry the son of the man who destroyed her father and brought shame on her family? Will coming home bring her love, or only danger and heartache?

Set in the exotic and bygone world of Upper Egypt, Song of the Nile follows Aida’s journey of rediscovery – of the homeland she loves, with its white-sailed feluccas on the Nile, old-world charms of Cairo and the ancient secrets of its burning desert sands – and of the man she has never forgotten.

A compelling story of passion and intrigue – a novel that lays open the beating heart of Egypt.

Song of the Nile: available to buy now

A little about me:

I was born in Alexandria, Egypt. Writing is in my blood: my granddaughter was Esther Fanous, a revolutionary feminist and writer in Egypt during the early 1900s, and my father wrote and published a history of our family. I began writing stories as a child, when I would trade tales with my French governess, and all through my teens I wrote love stories, which I would share with my fellow students at school.

After graduating with a degree in French literature, I developed a passion for travel, living in Switzerland, France and England. I met my English husband at a drinks party, and once we were married I was happily occupied bringing up our children and running my own business renovating rundown cottages. Only when my children were grown did I begin to write the novels that I had dreamed about for years.

These days, I divide my time between my homes in England and the South of France, and I try to write every day: it feeds my soul.