Girls of Riyadh - Rajaa Alsanea

A gossipy tale about the lives of a group of female friends in Saudi Arabia, this would be disposable holiday reading, sex-and-the-city style, if it weren't for the light it sheds on life - and particularly love and marriage - in that culture. The girls in the book are from the pampered "velvet class" (& for an interesting perspective on that see this review) but are still constantly frustrated by their position in society as women and the difficulty of finding and keeping a satisfying relationship. Most of the men in the book are portrayed as weak or hypocritical - divorcing a woman who agrees to sex between their marriage and the wedding celebration, sacrificing love to please their families, or casually mistreating a wife taken on reluctantly. The women are a little more varied, with some finding strength and ambition as the story unfolds, while others remain trapped by their obsession with the belief that finding a good husband is the main objective of a woman's life.