Brilliant

Brilliant is a collection of short stories set in Abu Dhabi, capital of the United Arab Emirates, a polyglot city where cultures collide and converge, where money — and sometimes justice — is no object, where in less than two generations towers have replaced tents. In these stories, a cast of characters — an Egyptian pastry chef, a Filipina nanny, a Canadian nurse, a lusty French urban planner, a newly destitute British couple, and a cross-dressing Emirati — navigate this land of sudden plenty, discovering the limits of freedom, money, tolerance and their own good sense.

AUTHOR

Denise Roig

Denise Roig has previously published two collections of short stories – A Quiet Night and a Perfect End, and Any Day Now. The first was translated into French as Le Vrai Secret du bonheur, with five stories produced on CBC Radio One’s “Between the Covers” in 2003, and rebroadcast in 2006. Any Day Now was shortlisted for the Quebec Writers’ Federation fiction prize in 2005. Denise has made a living for the past thirty years from corporate writing, freelance magazine and newspaper journalism and has taught both creative writing and journalism at Concordia University. Originally from Los Angeles, she has lived in Montreal for many years.

Reviews

An Egyptian pastry chef. A Canadian nanny. A philandering Frenchman. A Filipina maid. This multifarious cast of characters nearly climbs off the page in Denise Roig’s new volume of short stories, Brilliant. Set entirely in Abu Dhabi, capital of the United Arab Emirates, Brilliant paints a rich and at times unsettling portrait of a city that has suddenly found itself a fountain of excessive wealth, with all its attendant pleasures and pitfalls.

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