Inbox: Oranges, Sunshine and a Storm Coming | Sebastian Faulks

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What were British soldiers doing in Palestine in 1945, between the oranges, the swimming and the bombs? Why does the Christmas show in Sebastian Faulks's Jerusalem swap Gilbert and Sullivan for Oscar Wilde? And, how did a novelist who plans everything end up with a twist he never saw coming? Sebastian Faulks tells Peter Frankopan and Afua Hirsch how his father's posting, hundreds of hours of soldiers' memories and a much-missed friend became his new novel, Farewell to Eden. His father was sent from Italy in late 1945 for what the army called "rest and peacekeeping", and was there when the King David Hotel was bombed. Sebastian built the book from the Imperial War Museum's sound archive, a…