Medina in Birmingham, Najaf in Brent: Inside British Islam, by Innes Bowen

Don’t know your Deobandi from your Bohras? Innes Bowen provides a clear and detailed guide to the variety of Muslim streams and movements present in the UK. Although the book is now ten years old, it is still an invaluable source of background information. Bowen’s agenda is entirely informational; she is a BBC journalist who set out to research an area she did not know about. There is nothing else quite like it. She drew on the work of Muslim researcher Mehmood Naqshbandi whose website www.muslimsinbritain.org  provides helpful local information using terms which Bowen helps us interpret.