The Garden of Burning Sand: A Novel

A Canadian bestseller from the author of A Walk Across the Sun: the passionate tale of a young woman’s search for justice in the heart of sub-Saharan Africa

Lusaka, Zambia. Zoe Fleming is a young, idealistic American lawyer working with an NGO devoted to combating the epidemic of child sexual assault in southern Africa. Zoe’s organization is called in to help when an adolescent girl is brutally assaulted. The girl’s identity is a mystery. Where did she come from? Was the attack a random street crime or a premeditated act?

A betrayal in Zoe’s past gives a special resonance to the girl’s plight, and that drives Zoe to find the perpetrator. She gradually forms a working relationship, then a surprising friendship, with Joseph Kabuta, a Zambian police officer. Their search takes them from Lusaka’s roughest neighbourhoods to the wild waters of Victoria Falls, and from the AIDS-stricken streets of Johannesburg to the matchless splendour of Cape Town.

As the investigation builds to a climax, threatening to send shock waves through Zambian society, Zoe is forced to radically reshape her assumptions about love, loyalty, family and, especially, the meaning of justice.