The sand men

High-luxury resorts are growing from the ancient sands of Dubai; new playgrounds for the world's super-rich. Dream World, the latest and largest of these bubble towns of unreality to emerge, is ambitious, grandiose and in trouble. Roy Brook was a failing architect, now he's Dream World's latest hire and rising star, brought in to fix the failures that threaten the site's grand opening. But for his wife, Lea, life has been irrevocably changed; living in a gated community, she finds herself a virtual prisoner in a land where the wives appear happy to follow behind their husbands in the isolated shade of their luxury homes. At least there are a few friendly outsiders who don't enjoy the conformity of the ex-pat community - until one night, when the most outspoken one, Milo, is killed in a suspicious hit-andrun. Milo's death is the first in a string of terrible accidents that divide the foreign workers, as they start to blame migrants, Arabs and even each other. Lea is convinced that deliberate acts of cruelty are being committed - but is there a real threat to her life, or is she becoming paranoid? And what role does her estranged 15 year-old daughter Cara play? What happens in a world where only the rich are important? Welcome to a future that's five minutes away, where rebellion against conformity can lead to the unthinkable...