The Fish in the Tree

In the winter of 1974, Edie is on the rebound after breaking up with her hippy boyfriend and is suddenly swept off her feet by Kamal Shariff, a Malaysian lawyer she meets in Edinburgh.

Thrilled at the prospect of a more exciting way of life, Edie travels with Kamal to his homeland and finds herself immersed in a country more exotic than she could have imagined. She faces the challenges arising from a marriage between two races, cultures and religions, whilst also learning to integrate into both the indigenous and expatriate communities each with wildly different values.

Unprecedented events link Edie back to her father's family in Scotland. How does she reconcile her life in Kota Kinabalu with that of her father and grandmother who lived on Scotland's north-east coast? How can the aftermath of a murder in a Glasgow tenement have such a profound impression on Edie? By understanding the mysteries of the past, Edie manages to come to terms with her own devastating grief.

Malaysia and the island of Borneo provide the background to a story of an impressionable young woman's journey from Scotland to South-East Asia and where, with her quiet sense of purpose, she is able to find the happiness she craves.