To rendezvous with her archaeologist fiance in Jordan, Barbara Vaughn must first pass through the Mandelbaum gate – which divides strife-torn Jerusalem. A half-Jewish convert to Catholicism, an Englishwoman of strong and stubborn convictions, Barbara will not be dissuaded from her ill-timed pilgrimage – despite a very real threat of bodily harm and the fearful admonishments of staid British diplomat Freddy Hamilton. So they set out together to brace the Holy City, and are swept into a heart-stopping adventure of abduction and espionage – lost in a complex, labyrinthine world where the sacred and the profane explosively collide.
The Mandelbaum Gate is a superb, many-faceted novel, with a seriousness of purpose underlying the comic element, and enriched by a wealth of information.

MURIEL SPARK, born in Edinburgh in 1918, was the author of over twenty acclaimed novels, including The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, The Ballad of Peckham Rye, Symposium, The Bachelors, The Driver's Seat, A Far Cry from Kensington, and Aiding and Abetting.