The novel is set in the Lebanon and uses archaeology and cultural references as the context for the story of a relationship between Harry - an agent working for a specialist intelligence unit in Washington and Julie - a Dutch woman who used to live in Israel. She is trained in archaeology and is working as a journalist. He fails to tell her the whole truth as their relationship develops, particularly his secret meeting with a Sheikh from Hezbollah on the border with Israel. Then she takes him to meet a friend in Byblos. With ancient stories as a backcloth to current political events and attitudes, something happens to change them both. The metaphor of a cobweb winds itself through the story, as a reminder of the complexities involved, some of which can never be unravelled or fully explained.
About the Author: Robin Morrison has been a priest in the Anglican Church since 1970, working in specialist roles (London, Newcastle upon Tyne, Edinburgh, Birmingham, Derby, Southampton and Cardiff), as well as parishes. He spent a year studying Orthodox theology in Romania and then travelled extensively in Eastern Europe. He has been a hospital chaplain, an assistant head of a pioneering Community School in Scotland, a University Chaplain at Birmingham and Newcastle Universities, the Principal Social Responsibility Officer in Derby Diocese and an Industrial Chaplain across the Central South Coast of England. Before retiring in 2011, he was the Church and Society Officer for the Church in Wales, with a portfolio including International and Environmental work, as well as social and economic policy. He has chaired several bodies including the Institute of Directors in South Wales and a Health Trust. He is on various boards, including a University, a Free School and Artes Mundi and chairs Coleridge in Wales and a local archery club. He paints a little and produces photo poems (including commissions). His other novels are The Lawn in the Mud, One Leg is both the Same, Shadows of Memory, The Photograph, The Playground and Virtual Apocalypse. His book of collected poems is called Finding a Way. He has written a Trilogy of books called Love's Energy - on pattern paradoxes in cosmology, quantum and evolution. The science took 12 years to research including visits to CERN. He believes it speaks to those who are fascinated by the big questions in science - and, for whom, different kinds of creationism are no longer tenable (and dangerous geopolitically, in Islam and Christianity) - but still want to explore what it could mean to talk about a Creator or Source, in a universe that 'makes itself.' He is married to Linda and they live in Barry, Wales. They have one daughter Jane, married to Christian and two wonderful grandchildren Amélie and Theo.