 The family provides the novel with its structure, since the plot is concerned with the lives and interrelationships of its members.However, the story is not set in isolation; indeed, the characters themselves are important mediators between issues of local or wider scope.For example, the theme of 'authority' (particularly its establishment and subversion) is woven into both the maturation of the children of the al-Jawad family and the wider political circumstances which provide the novel with its temporal boundaries.