Jonathan Falla, author of the acclaimed Blue Poppies, follows up with a devastating story set among the harsh deserts of Western Sudan. Ten years in the writing, the book is disturbingly prescient of recent events.

Set in Darfur, this is the dramatic and frightening story of improbable love between two people working for a European aid agency caught up in an African crisis. Mogga and Leila, a black and an Arab, have been badly wounded by their past. But, as the country teeters on the edge of famine and civil war, they cling to each other's dignity, humour and humanity.

Based on his own experience of aid agencies, Falla's novel is fiercely authentic, dramatic and darkly witty. As the expatriates bicker, their English team leader forms an unholy alliance with a local security chief in a struggle to unravel the evil politics behind the famine. The foreigners always have the option of a flight out. For Mogga and Leila, the choices are few and stark.

"An outstanding novel." Sunday Times. "Compelling and tragically relevant." BBC 'Front Row'. "A vivid, engrossing work of fiction." The Guardian. "A profound and engrossing novel that works on several levels – emotional, political and moral. An unusual love story told with insight and tenderness." Scottish Review of Books. "This informed, angry book is full of passion and detail." Sunday Herald. "So accurate and unsentimental is his evocation of that remote place, that it forms itself almost physically before me..." The Scotsman.