A powerful debut novel about the harsh reality of the British campaign in Mesopotamia in the First World War has been released by Llanybydder writer Ruqaya Izzidien.

The Watermelon Boys is set in the winter of 1915 and Iraq has been engulfed by the war.

Hungry for independence from Ottoman rule, Ahmad leaves his peaceful family life on the banks of the Tigris to join the British-led revolt. Thousands of miles away Carwyn, a teenager in south Wales, reluctantly enlists and is sent, via Gallipoli and Egypt, to the Mesopotamia campaign in Baghdad.

Carwyn and Ahmad’s paths cross and their fates are bound together.

Ruqaya Izzidien’s novel offers a powerful retelling of the history of British intervention in Iraq.

Explaining how she came to write the book, the former Fynnonbedr Primary School and Lampeter High School pupil said: “I researched and wrote this book over the course of about four years.

“The idea first came to me when my paternal (Iraqi) grandfather passed away.

“He lived a very interesting life and over the years I heard some unusual tales from him, including some stories that I felt were extremely historically significant.

“The idea for The Watermelon Boys started with two of my grandfather’s stories, and it blossomed from there.

“The Watermelon Boys is first and foremost a story about an ordinary family trying to do the right thing, in brutal and pivotal circumstances. But it is also an act of redressing the narratives about Arabs that exists in colonial-era fiction, and, unfortunately, persists in British society today.

“I feel incredibly lucky to have been able to write this book, and to have had the chance to draw together my two communities in a way that is unique and incredibly valuable to their understanding of one another."

See this week’s south papers for the full story, available in shops and as a digital edition tomorrow