It’s 1476 with the sun close to setting on 700 years of Moorish rule when Boabdil, heir to the throne of Granada, and two schoolfriends find themselves confronted by their individual challenges as the brutal reality of pre-inquisition Spain forces them to face the future. Is it chance that Boabdil finds himself on the doorstep of the great warrior General Ali al-Attar one dark night and that Attar will become the father-figure he lacks? Is it chance this also turns out to be the occasion on which he comes across the young girl he will fall in love with? Is it chance or is it written in the stars? In this compelling novel of power, treachery, cross cultural friendship, loyalty and lasting love, Tangea Tansley reimagines history to bring alive a pivotal period in the life of the last sultan to rule on the Iberian Peninsula. Snakes in Paradise follows Boabdil’s journey from an adolescence dominated by a callous father, through the twists and turns of palace life and the cloudy torment of his own doubts, to a place where he is lured into a cunningly laid trap, where everything he has worked towards and accomplished is threatened.
