The inspiring true story of a prizewinning foreign correspondent longing for a child, two small Iraqi girls in need of a mother, and what love and grief can teach us about family and hope.

Zahra, age three, and Hawra, only a few months old, were the only survivors of a missile strike in Baghdad in 2003 that killed their parents and five siblings. Across the world, in London, foreign correspondent Hala Jaber was preparing to head to Iraq to cover the emerging war. After ten years spent trying to conceive, Jaber and her husband had finally resigned themselves to a childless future. Now she intended to bury her grief in her work, with some unusually dangerous reporting. Once in Iraq, though, Jaber found herself drawn again and again to stories of mothers and children, a path that led her to an Iraqi children's hospital-and to Zahra and Hawra and their heart-wrenching story. Almost instantly Jaber became entwined in the lives of these girls, and in a struggle to advocate on their behalf that reveals far more about the human cost of war than any news bulletin ever could.

Beautifully written and deeply moving, The Flying Carpet of Small Miracles presents a genuinely fresh insight and perspective from a woman who, as an Arab living and working in the West, is able to uniquely straddle both worlds. In its attention to the emotional experiences of women and children whose lives are irrevocably changed by war, Jaber's story offers hope for redemption for those caught in its cross fires.

2. Should the orphans and civilian victims of the war with Iraq receive compensation for their losses? If so, what should it be and how could it be distributed? Who should provide it? 
3. “After receiving another award for my reports from Iraq, I gave a little speech in front of some of the best writers and broadcasters in the country but could not muster much joie de vivre…I asked: ‘Is it right to benefit like this from other people’s misery?’” (p. 167). What do you imagine are the biggest challenges and rewards of being a war correspondent? 
4. Have you or anyone you know struggled with infertility? If so, how did this inform your reading of Jaber’s memoir? 
5. If you were Hawra’s grandmother, would you have chosen to keep her near you, or would you have tried to persuade Jaber to adopt her? 
6. Do you agree with Jaber’s assessment that Hawra, at six, is too old to uproot from her home in Baghdad to live in another culture? Or is it Jaber who had become too set in her ways to become a full-time mother? 
7. Overall, do you believe that international adoption is a good or bad institution? Why? 
8. Should Steve have been more vocal about his own desires regarding fatherhood?  
9. At one point during her struggle to conceive, Jaber’s sister, Rana, offers to carry their child. “It will still be your baby, from your IVF, but instead of being planted in you, I’ll carry him for you,” (p. 32) she pleads, but her offer is turned down. Do you agree with Jaber’s decision? Does being Muslim complicate their dilemma in other ways? 
10. The issue of class is touched on very briefly as a potential roadblock to Jaber’s adoption of Hawra. Do you think it may have played a larger factor than Jaber explicates? 
11. What do you imagine might have happened to Jaber and Bent’s marriage if 9/11 hadn’t galvanized Jaber to renew her career? 
12.  Jaber and her husband, Steve Bent, have worked together as a journalist/ photographer team under some of the most intense, terrifying circumstances imaginable. What are the advantages and disadvantages that they, as a married couple, have over ordinary coworkers? 
13. Did Ali benefit from his time in England or did it ultimately render him unsuited for life in Baghdad? 
14. How, if at all, did this book change your perspective on the war in Iraq, or war in general? 
15. If you could ask Jaber one question about the incidents covered in this book, what would it be?

This book is on these lists:

• January 2012 Indie Next List
• December 2011 Indie Next List
• November 2011 Indie Next List