When the Apricots Bloom is a well-written look at the life people lived under the Hussein regime of Iraq, and how it forced people to do things they wouldn't normally do, and how the slightest unsavory comment casually mentioned to even the closest of friends could literally be the undoing of someone - and their whole entire family. Wilkinson chooses to focus her book on the interconnection of three women, Huda, a woman who grew up poor but has elevated herself to a role in the Australian embassy, Rania, the daughter of a sheikh from the same tribe as Huda that has now fallen on harder times, and Ally, the young wife of an Australian ambassador. While Huda and Rania have drifted apart over the years they are brought back together when Huda, acting as an informant through no choice of her own, brings Ally into the orbit of Rania. And while Ally's intentions for following her husband to Iraq to learn more about her deceased mother are pure they set in motion a course of events that put her as well as Huda and Rania's families at risk. There are many points during this book where it's hard not to feel some disgust at a decision someone makes, but at the same time it's hard not to imagine making the same one yourself if put in that same position. It never feels like Wilkinson over dramatizes her story which makes the fact that people live like this so much more horrifying. There's also a point in the story where Huda is concerned about a movement involving clerics that would strip women of even more rights and how Saddam Hussein at least allowed women some rights and control. This simple moment to me in the book amplified how as outsiders we don't always realize the potential ramifications of getting involved in something we don't fully understand. And while this book does a beautiful job of teaching me how dangerous and complicated life in Iraq under Hussein was, it feels like just the tiniest peek into a different world through the eyes of three different, but strong women.