Inspiration for The Long Road from Kandahar

  These are grainy photos of me standing in front of the golden Pir Panjal Range of mountains near Murree, once a popular Hill Station in the District of Punjab.  We had just driven up the steep, isolated road from Rawalpindi, through tiny villages full of fierce turbaned Punjabis, not a woman to be seen. This was hostile Taliban country, and we were acutely aware of it in the piercing glances into our car. Mobile cameras were not so sophisticated in 2009. They could not capture the sheer beauty of the Kashmiri mountains, nor convey the heady smell of honeysuckle or the sound of bees filling the silence. Delicate, bright butterflies fluttered in and out of the shade of trees, and the air, after Karachi, was as pure as ice, with a pungent peace and calm. Our driver had stopped as we neared our hotel so we could admire the view and take photos of each other, and him. He encouraged us to walk away into the cool of shady trees, but we were reluctant to wander too far into that impregnable silence. He sensed our unease and assured us that we were absolutely safe here. A fact contradicted, later, by gun toting guards who followed us up a mountain walk in order to keep us safe. As I moved into the shade, I heard the sound of sheep and suddenly caught bright flashes of colour through the trees. Small giggling children ran from nowhere to take a look at us, disappearing rapidly before I could take a photo. Photos tell their own stories in the single click of a camera; a smile, a moment created, but they never tell the whole truth.  As I stood in front of those mountains bathed in golden light, smiling, I was aware of the distant drum of anxiety. There is risk attached to westerners travelling alone in North Pakistan. Extreme poverty gives rise to kidnap. Friends had advised against the trip, but we wanted to see as much of Pakistan as we could. There is one photo of me in the formally planted English rose garden in the hotel grounds.  The British influence on gardening in this holiday resort remains everywhere, but my face reflects only discomfort. For the first time in my life, I was experiencing the feeling of being an unwanted outsider. The hostility of the hotel staff  was only mitigated by the friendliness of other holiday makers from Lahore. The drive back down the isolated road to Rawalpindi, with a new and unvetted driver the hotel insisted we take, was terrifying. He repeatedly stopped in remote spots, refusing to engage when we asked him to keep driving to Islamabad airport. We were both silently convinced we were going to be kidnapped. Eventually, he linked up with another car driving the other way and we braced ourselves for the worst. However, a piece of paper was passed between them, our driver relaxed, even tried to be friendly, and did not stop again until we reached Islamabad Airport. Despite being way out of my comfort zone I will never regret experiencing the beauty of North Pakistan. Raza, the wonderful Pakistani boy in my new book, The Long Road from Kandahar was inspired by my trip to Muree. An outsider in the UK, he forms a close bond with Finn, the son of a British soldier fighting in Afghanistan.  I wanted to explore the effect of war through the eyes of two boys from very different cultures. The first idea for this book came while I was living in Karachi. My son was posted to Lashkar Gah and the amorphous border between Afghanistan and Pakistan felt perilously close… The Long Road to Kandahar is out on May 12 and I really hope my lovely readers will enjoy it.