Close friend or government spy?

Published: Jan. 25, 2021, 8:15 a.m.

In a country under dictatorship, with a powerful secret police force, how can you know who to trust? Gina Wilkinson moved to Iraq shortly before the US invasion, when her husband got a job in the country with UNICEF. She later found out that one of her close friends in Baghdad had been spying on her for the Mukhabarat. That personal story has inspired her new novel, When the Apricots Bloom