The Tears of Sheba: Tales of Survival and Intrigue in Arabia

Yemen in the 1960s was a society where loyalty, blood ties and honour meant everything, yet murder, forced marriages, family feuds and public beheadings were common. The Tears of Sheba is the inspiring story of Khadija Al-Salami, whose personal struggle for survival shows a deep-rooted love for her country and its people.

Khadija tells of a childhood devastated by the impact of civil war, in a culture that allowed her to be married at the age of ten to an older man she had never met. Determined to escape the poverty, death and destruction that permeated her life, and with extraordinary tenacity, Khadija asked the local radio station to let her broadcast a programme for children, later using the money she earned to travel to the United States and forge a new life for herself. The Tears of Sheba is a magnificent tour-de-force, passionately told, spellbinding and uplifting - a tale of indomitable spirit and human triumph.

KHADIJA AL-SALAMI spent her childhood in Yemen. Using the money she earned as a child for her radio broadcasts she travelled to the United States to study. She graduated from Mount Vernon College in Washington and returned to Yemen to join the Yemeni TV station. She subsequently joined the Yemeni Embassy in Paris, where she is currently Press and Cultural Attache and Director of the Yemeni Information Centre in Paris.