Author Gina Wilkinson was formerly a foreign correspondent who spent more than a year in Baghdad during Saddam Hussein’s rule. One of her close friends at the time was an informant for the mukhabarat, much like Huda, but Wilkinson says that neither Huda nor Ally are accurate representations of her friend or herself. In 2007, Wilkinson published her memoir, Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sky, which details the troubles she faced as a foreign correspondent.

When the Apricots Bloom is Gina Wilkinson’s second book and her first fiction novel. In her Author’s Note, Wilkinson explains that, while she shared some experiences similar to those that Ally, Huda, and Rania experience in the novel, Ally does not represent her, and Huda and Rania are not based entirely on any of her real-life friends. However, When the Apricots Bloom is nonetheless based on Wilkinson’s time in Baghdad in 2002 when she traveled with her husband, who was working with the humanitarian aid organization UNICEF. Like Ally, Wilkinson kept her status as a journalist hidden to avoid Iraq’s ban on foreign journalists.

In addition to sharing Ally’s profession, Wilkinson also had a close Iraqi friend who, like Huda, was an informant for the mukhabarat.