Talking about Jane Austen in Baghdad

A London mum and Iraqi teacher should have nothing in common.

Yet now, despite their differences, they're the firmest of friends . . . Talking About Jane Austen in Baghdad by Bee Rowlatt and May Witwit is a touching and poignant portrait of an unlikely friendship. Would you brave gun-toting militias for a cut and blow dry?May's a tough-talking, hard-smoking, lecturer in English.

She's also an Iraqi from a Sunni-Shi'ite background living in Baghdad, dodging bullets before breakfast, bargaining for high heels in bombed-out bazaars and battling through blockades to reach her class of Jane Austen-studying girls.

Bee, on the other hand, is a London mum of three, busy fighting off PTA meetings and chicken pox, dealing with dead cats and generally juggling work and family while squabbling with her globe-trotting husband over the socks he leaves lying around the house. They should have nothing in common. But when a simple email brings them together, they discover a friendship that overcomes all their differences of culture, religion and age.

Talking About Jane Austen in Baghdad is the story of two women who share laughter and tears, and swap their confidences, dreams and fears. And, between the grenades, the gossip, the jokes and the secrets, they also hatch an ingenious plan to help May escape the bombings of Baghdad . . . Bee Rowlatt is a former show-girl turned BBC World Service journalist.

A mother of three and would-be do-gooder, she can find keeping her career going while caring for her three daughters (and husband) pretty tough, even in leafy North London.

May Witwit is an Iraqi expert in Chaucer and sender of emails depicting kittens in fancy dress.

She is prepared to face every hazard imaginable to make that all-important hairdresser's appointment.