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Reading lists

10 books about Muslim experiences to read this Ramadan

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Must-read books by women, as chosen by our readers

Books by Elif Shafak on a colourful background.

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Where to start reading Elif Shafak’s books

The Forty Rules of Love

The international bestseller from the author of the Booker-shortlisted novel, 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World, The Forty Rules of Love is part of our Penguin Essentials series which spotlights the very best of our modern classics 
 
*One of the BBC's '100 Novels That Shaped the World'* 
 
&quot;Every true love and friendship is a story of unexpected transformation. If we are the same person before and after we loved, that means we haven't loved enough...&quot; 
 
Ella Rubinstein has a husband, three teenage children, and a pleasant home. Everything that should make her confident and fulfilled. Yet there is an emptiness at the heart of Ella's life - an emptiness once filled by love. 
 
So when Ella reads a manuscript about the thirteenth-century Sufi poet Rumi and Shams of Tabriz, and his forty rules of life and love, her world is turned upside down. She embarks on a journey to meet the mysterious author of this work. 
 
It is a quest infused with Sufi mysticism and verse, taking Ella and us into an exotic world where faith and love are heartbreakingly explored. . . 
 
'The past and present fit together beautifully in a passionate defence of passion itself' The Times 
 
'Colourfully woven and beguilingly intelligent' Daily Telegraph 
 
*** ELIF SHAFAK'S NEW NOVEL, THERE ARE RIVERS IN THE SKY, IS AVAILABLE FOR PRE-ORDER NOW ***

With its timely, thought-provoking message . . . The Forty Rules of Love deserves to be a global publishing phenomenon

Enlightening, enthralling. An affecting paean to faith and love

Colourfully woven and beguilingly intelligent

The past and present fit together beautifully in a passionate defence of passion itself

Elif Shafak is an award-winning British Turkish novelist, whose work has been translated into fifty-six languages. The author of nineteen books, twelve of which are novels, she is a bestselling author in many countries around the world. Shafak's last novel, The Island of Missing Trees, was a top ten Sunday Times bestseller, and was shortlisted for the Costa Novel Award and the Women's Prize for Fiction. Her novel 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and the RSL Ondaatje Prize. There Are Rivers in the Sky is her latest novel.

Ella Rubinstein has a husband, three teenage children, and a pleasant home. Everything that should make her confident and fulfilled. Yet there is an emptiness at the heart of Ella's life - an emptiness once filled by love. 
 
So when Ella reads a manuscript about the thirteenth-century Sufi poet Rumi and Shams of Tabriz, and his forty rules of life and love, she is shocked out of herself. Turning her back on her family she embarks on a journey to meet the mysterious author of this work. 
 
It is a quest infused with Sufi mysticism and verse, taking Ella and us into an exotic world where faith and love are heartbreakingly explored...

How great artists and their work were shaped by the First World War

Minds at War

The complete BBC Radio 3 series exploring how great creative minds responded to the First World War in individual works of art and scholarship 
 
World War I saw an unprecedented loss of life in Western Europe, and destruction on a scale no one alive had ever seen. All those who experienced it were irrevocably changed, including many writers and artists upon whose oeuvre it left an indelible mark. 
 
This captivating series examines the impact of the war on artists and thinkers through the prism of their great works. In each episode, a leading figure from the worlds of science, culture and the arts reflects on a single iconic piece, and discusses how the events of 1914-18 shaped its creation. 
 
The 29 artworks in this collection comprise paintings, plays, books, films, sculptures and cartoons. Ian Christie appraises Eisenstein's seminal Soviet drama Battleship Potemkin; Dame Gillian Beer considers Virginia Woolf's masterpiece Mrs Dalloway; Fintan O'Toole decodes James Joyce's epic modernist novel, Ulysses; and Dr Heather Jones looks at the controversy and war connections around Marcel Duchamp's notorious 'Fountain'. 
 
Key texts such as Sigmund Freud's twin essays Thoughts for the Time on War and Death; Rabindranath Tagore's Nobel Lectures; and Siegfried Sassoon's celebrated 1917 protest letter to The Times are analysed by Dr Michael Shapira, Santanu Das and Joanna Bourke; and a panoply of other pieces, among them Kathe Kollwitz's 'The Grieving Parents', Sean O'Casey's The Silver Tassie and Rudyard Kipling's Epitaphs are discussed by experts including Ruth Padel, Elizabeth Kuti and Janet Montefiore. 
 
Powerful, moving, thought-provoking and often shocking, these landmark works are all, in their very different ways, a response to the horrors of World War I and its aftermath - one that vividly demonstrates the transformative effects the conflict had on the collective artistic psyche. 
 
Production credits 
Presented by Allan Little, Sara LeFanu, Martin Rowson, Prof David Edgerton, Michal Shapira, Dr Heather Jones, Ian Christie, Lyse Doucet, Santanu Das, Ruth Padel, Arthur Smith, Prof Gillian Beer, Richard Cork, Sasha Dugdale, Fintan O'Toole, Gerald Dawe, John D McHugh, Elizabeth Kuti, Tarek Osman, Joanna Bourke, Elif Shafak, Dr Imaobong Umoren, Janet Montefiore, Jane Potter and Alex Walton 
Produced by Beaty Rubens, Benedict Warren, Emma Kingsley, Simon Elmes and Sarah Bowen 
 
Episode list: 
1. Paths of Glory 
2. Non-Combatants and Others 
3. Der Krieg 
4. The Memorandum on the Neglect of Science 
5. Thoughts for the Times on War and Death 
6. Le Feu 
7. Battleship Potemkin 
8. Fighting France, from Dunkerque to Belfort 
9. The Broken Wing 
10. The Grieving Parents 
11. Tagore's Nobel Lectures 
12. Tzara's Dada Manifesto 
13. Woolf's Mrs Dalloway 
14. Parade 
15. Akhmatova's July 1914 
16. James Joyce's Ulysses 
17. Elizabeth Bowen's The Last September 
18. Francis Ledwidge's poem O'Connell Street 
19. Father Browne's Photograph of a Wounded Soldier 
20. Sean O'Casey's The Silver Tassie 
21. Marcel Duchamp 
22. Gertrude Bell 
23. Siegfried Sassoon's Letter to The Times 
24. Mata Hari's Final Performance 
25. Isaac Rosenberg's Dead Man's Dump 
26. WEB Dubois' Returning Soldiers 
27. Rudyard Kipling's Epitaphs 
28. Mary Borden's The Forbidden Zone 
29. Isobel Rae 
 
© 2022 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd (P) 2022 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd

The complete BBC Radio 3 series exploring how great creative minds responded to the First World War in individual works of art and scholarship 
 
World War I saw an unprecedented loss of life in Western Europe, and destruction on a scale no one alive had ever seen. All those who experienced it were irrevocably changed, including many writers and artists upon whose oeuvre it left an indelible mark. 
 
This captivating series examines the impact of the war on artists and thinkers through the prism of their great works. In each episode, a leading figure from the worlds of science, culture and the arts reflects on a single iconic piece, and discusses how the events of 1914-18 shaped its creation. 
 
The 29 artworks in this collection comprise paintings, plays, books, films, sculptures and cartoons. Ian Christie appraises Eisenstein's seminal Soviet drama Battleship Potemkin; Dame Gillian Beer considers Virginia Woolf's masterpiece Mrs Dalloway; Fintan O'Toole decodes James Joyce's epic modernist novel, Ulysses; and Dr Heather Jones looks at the controversy and war connections around Marcel Duchamp's notorious 'Fountain'. 
 
Key texts such as Sigmund Freud's twin essays Thoughts for the Time on War and Death; Rabindranath Tagore's Nobel Lectures; and Siegfried Sassoon's celebrated 1917 protest letter to The Times are analysed by Dr Michael Shapira, Santanu Das and Joanna Bourke; and a panoply of other pieces, among them Kathe Kollwitz's 'The Grieving Parents', Sean O'Casey's The Silver Tassie and Rudyard Kipling's Epitaphs are discussed by experts including Ruth Padel, Elizabeth Kuti and Janet Montefiore. 
 
Powerful, moving, thought-provoking and often shocking, these landmark works are all, in their very different ways, a response to the horrors of World War I and its aftermath - one that vividly demonstrates the transformative effects the conflict had on the collective artistic psyche. 
 
Production credits 
Presented by Allan Little, Sara LeFanu, Martin Rowson, Prof David Edgerton, Michal Shapira, Dr Heather Jones, Ian Christie, Lyse Doucet, Santanu Das, Ruth Padel, Arthur Smith, Prof Gillian Beer, Richard Cork, Sasha Dugdale, Fintan O'Toole, Gerald Dawe, John D McHugh, Elizabeth Kuti, Tarek Osman, Joanna Bourke, Elif Shafak, Dr Imaobong Umoren, Janet Montefiore, Jane Potter and Alex Walton 
Produced by Beaty Rubens, Benedict Warren, Emma Kingsley, Simon Elmes and Sarah Bowen 
 
Episode list: 
1. Paths of Glory 
2. Non-Combatants and Others 
3. Der Krieg 
4. The Memorandum on the Neglect of Science 
5. Thoughts for the Times on War and Death 
6. Le Feu 
7. Battleship Potemkin 
8. Fighting France, from Dunkerque to Belfort 
9. The Broken Wing 
10. The Grieving Parents 
11. Tagore's Nobel Lectures 
12. Tzara's Dada Manifesto 
13. Woolf's Mrs Dalloway 
14. Parade 
15. Akhmatova's July 1914 
16. James Joyce's Ulysses 
17. Elizabeth Bowen's The Last September 
18. Francis Ledwidge's poem O'Connell Street 
19. Father Browne's Photograph of a Wounded Soldier 
20. Sean O'Casey's The Silver Tassie 
21. Marcel Duchamp 
22. Gertrude Bell 
23. Siegfried Sassoon's Letter to The Times 
24. Mata Hari's Final Performance 
25. Isaac Rosenberg's Dead Man's Dump 
26. WEB Dubois' Returning Soldiers 
27. Rudyard Kipling's Epitaphs 
28. Mary Borden's The Forbidden Zone 
29. Isobel Rae 
 
© 2022 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd (P) 2022 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd

The Island of Missing Trees

SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION 2022 
THE TOP TEN SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER &amp; REESE WITHERSPOON BOOK CLUB PICK 
 
***** 
 
You don't fall in love in Cyprus in the summer of 1974. Not here, not now. 
 
In 1974, two teenagers, from opposite sides of a divided Cyprus, meet at a tavern in the city they both call home. The tavern is the only place that Kostas, who is Greek, and Defne who is Turkish, can meet in secret, hidden beneath the leaves of a fig tree growing through the roof of the tavern. This tree will witness their hushed happy meetings, and will be there when the war breaks out and the teenagers vanish. 
 
Decades later in north London, sixteen-year-old Ada has never visited the island where her parents were born. She seeks to untangle years of her family's silence, but the only connection she has to the land of her ancestors Is a fig tree growing tin the garden of their home . . . 
 
***** 
 
'This book moved me to tears . . . in the best way. Powerful and poignant' Reese Witherspoon 
 
'A brilliant novel -- one that rings with Shafak's characteristic compassion' Robert Macfarlane 
 
'This is an enchanting, compassionate and wise novel and storytelling at its most sublime' Polly Samson 
 
*** ELIF SHAFAK'S NEW NOVEL, THERE ARE RIVERS IN THE SKY, IS AVAILABLE FOR PRE-ORDER NOW ***

An outstanding work of breathtaking beauty

A writer of important, beautiful, painful, truthful novels

Lovely heartbreaker of a novel centered on dark secrets of civil wars &amp; evils of extremism: Cyprus, star-crossed lovers, killed beloveds, damaged kids

Elif Shafak is a unique and powerful voice in world literature

One of the best writers in the world today

A wise novel of love and grief, roots and branches, displacement and home, faith and belief. The Island of Missing Trees is balm for our bruised times

Two teenagers, a Greek Cypriot and a Turkish Cypriot, meet at a taverna on the island they both call home. The taverna It is 1974 on the island of Cyprus. Two teenagers, from opposite sides of a divided land, meet at a tavern in the city they both call home. The tavern is the only place that Kostas, who is Greek and Christian, and Defne, who is Turkish and Muslim, can meet, in secret, hidden beneath the blackened beams from which hang garlands of garlic, chilli peppers and wild herbs. This is where one can find the best food in town, the best music, the best wine. But there is something else to the place: it makes one forget, even if for just a few hours, the world outside and its immoderate sorrows. 
 
In the centre of the tavern, growing through a cavity in the roof, is a fig tree. This tree will witness their hushed, happy meetings, their silent, surreptitious departures; and the tree will be there when the war breaks out, when the capital is reduced to rubble, when the teenagers vanish and break apart. 
 
Decades later in north London, sixteen-year-old Ada Kazantzakis has never visited the island where her parents were born. Desperate for answers, she seeks to untangle years of secrets, separation and silence. The only connection she has to the land of her ancestors is a Ficus Carica growing in the back garden of their home. 
 
In The Island of Missing Trees, prizewinning author Elif Shafak brings us a rich, magical tale of belonging and identity, love and trauma, memory and amnesia, human-induced destruction of nature, and, finally, renewal.

10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World

SHORTLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE 2019 
 
'Expect vibrant, vivid and eye-opening descriptions of Middle Eastern life propelled by a tender storyline, all in Shafak's haunting, beautiful and considered prose' Vanity Fair 
 
'Incredibly sensuous and poetic and evocative' Pandora Sykes 
 
'Richly uplifting... truly beautiful writing' Nicola Sturgeon 
 
'In the first minute following her death, Tequila Leila's consciousness began to ebb, slowly and steadily, like a tide receding from the shore...' 
 
For Leila, each minute after her death recalls a sensuous memory: spiced goat stew, sacrificed by her father to celebrate the birth of a yearned-for son; bubbling vats of lemon and sugar to wax women's legs while men are at prayer; the cardamom coffee she shares with a handsome student in the brothel where she works. Each fading memory brings back the friends she made in her bittersweet life - friends who are now desperately trying to find her . . . 
 
'Simply magnificent, a truly captivating work of immense power and beauty, on the essence of life and its end' Philippe Sands 
 
'Elif Shafak brings into the written realm what so many others want to leave outside. Spend more than ten minutes and 38 seconds in this world of the estranged. Shafak makes a new home for us in words' Colum McCann 
 
'Elif Shafak's extraordinary 10 Minutes, 38 Seconds in this Strange World is a work of brutal beauty and consummate tenderness' Simon Schama 
 
'A rich, sensual novel... This is a novel that gives voice to the invisible, the untouchable, the abused and the damaged, weaving their painful songs into a thing of beauty.' Financial Times 
 
'One of the best writers in the world today' Hanif Kureishi 
 
'Haunting, moving, beautifully written. A masterpiece' Peter Frankopan 
 
'Extraordinary' Guardian 
 
'Life-affirming' Stylist 
 
 
*** ELIF SHAFAK'S NEW NOVEL, THERE ARE RIVERS IN THE SKY, IS AVAILABLE NOW ***

A truly captivating work of immense power and beauty

Haunting, moving, beautifully written

A rich, sensual novel... This is a novel that gives voice to the invisible, the untouchable, the abused and the damaged, weaving their painful songs into a thing of beauty.

One of the best writers in the world today

Shafak is the most exciting Turkish novelist to reach western readers in years

A terrific book. Poetic, poignant, trenchant

A thoughtful, charming book that offers a connection to other worlds, perspectives and possibilities

A vivid carnival of life and death, cruelty and kindness, love, politics and deep humanity. This is only possible in the hands of a consummate storyteller. Elif Shafak's lyrical command of language and narrative is breathtaking. Brilliant!

Elif Shafak brings into the written realm what so many others want to leave outside. Spend more than ten minutes and 38 seconds in this world of the estranged. Shafak makes a new home for us in words

Elif Shafak's extraordinary Ten Minutes, 38 Seconds in this Strange World is a work of brutal beauty and consummate tenderness, a wild shout of life from out of the lower depths of destitution and prostitution, indeed from beyond the grave itself. Every page throbs with unruly vitality, the sense- saturating colours scents and sounds of raw Istanbul, all registered with poetic sharpness. It's a book which for all its ordeals is a profoundly moving, at times lyrical, celebration of humanity's obstinate fight for life against the steepest of odds

A heartbreaking meditation on the ways in which social forces can destroy a life. Elif Shafak can be unsparing, lyrical, political, intimate... Several novels live in this one, and all of them are moving, generous and elegantly written

'In the first minute following her death, Tequila Leila's consciousness began to ebb, slowly and steadily, like a tide receding from the shore. Her brain cells, having run out of blood, were now completely deprived of oxygen. But they did not shut down. Not right away...' 
 
For Leila, each minute after her death brings a sensuous memory: the taste of spiced goat stew, sacrificed by her father to celebrate the long-awaited birth of a son; the sight of bubbling vats of lemon and sugar which the women use to wax their legs while the men attend mosque; the scent of cardamom coffee that Leila shares with a handsome student in the brothel where she works. Each memory, too, recalls the friends she made at each key moment in her life - friends who are now desperately trying to find her. . .

Honour

From Booker-shortlisted author Elif Shafak, Honour is a gripping tale of love, betrayal and clashing cultures. 
 
'My mother died twice. I promised myself I would not let her story be forgotten' 
 
Pembe and Adem Toprak leave Turkey for London. There they make new lives for their family. Yet the traditions and beliefs of their home come with them - carried in the blood of their children, Iskender and Esma. Trapped by past mistakes, the Toprak children find their lives torn apart and transformed by a brutal and chilling crime. 
 
Set in Turkey and London in the 1970s, Honour explores pain and loss, loyalty and betrayal, the clash of tradition and modernity, as well as the love and heartbreak that can tear any family apart. 
 
'One of the best writers in the world today' Hanif Kureishi 
 
'Vivid storytelling... that explores the darkest aspects of faith and love' Sunday Telegraph

A powerful book; thoughtful, provoking and compassionate

Joanne Harris, bestselling author of 'Chocolat'

Vivid storytelling...  that explores the darkest aspects of faith and love

[Elif Shafak] joins writers such as Hanif Kureishi, Zadie Smith, Monica Ali, Aamer Hussein, Andrea Levy, Hanan al-Shakyh and Leila Aboulela, who offer us fictional glimpses of London's Others

Fascinating and gripping - a wonderful novel

'My mother died twice. I promised myself I would not let her story be forgotten' 
 
Pembe and Adem Toprak leave Turkey for London. There they make new lives for their family. Yet the traditions and beliefs of their home come with them - carried in the blood of their children, Iskender and Esma. Trapped by past mistakes, the Toprak children find their lives torn apart and transformed by a brutal and chilling crime. 
 
Set in Turkey and London in the 1970s, Honour explores pain and loss, loyalty and betrayal, the clash of tradition and modernity, as well as the love and heartbreak that can tear any family apart.

The Bastard of Istanbul

One rainy afternoon in Istanbul, a woman walks into a doctor's surgery. 'I need to have an abortion', she announces. She is nineteen years old and unmarried. What happens that afternoon will change her life. 
 
Twenty years later, Asya Kazanci lives with her extended family in Istanbul. Due to a mysterious family curse, all the Kaznci men die in their early forties, so it is a house of women, among them Asya's beautiful, rebellious mother Zeliha, who runs a tattoo parlour; Banu, who has newly discovered herself as clairvoyant; and Feride, a hypochondriac obsessed with impending disaster. And when Asya's Armenian-American cousin Armanoush comes to stay, long hidden family secrets connected with Turkey's turbulent past begin to emerge. 
 
'Wonderfully magical, incredible, breathtaking...will have you gasping with disbelief in the last few pages' Sunday Express 
 
'A beautiful book, the finest I have read about Turkey' Irish Times 
 
'Heartbreaking...the beauty of Islam pervades Shafak's book' Vogue

Tremendous exuberance . . . I do like a writer with a purpose

Overflows with a kitchen sink's worth of zany characters &hellip; an entertaining and insightful ensemble novel that posits the universality of family, culture and coincidence

Unquestionably an ambitious book, exuberant and teeming

Heartbreaking... the beauty of Islam pervades Shafak's book

One rainy afternoon in Istanbul a woman walks into a doctor's surgery. 'I want an abortion', she announces. She is nineteen years old, and unmarried. What happens that afternoon is to change her life, and the lives of everyone around her. 
 
Twenty years later, Asya Kazanci lives with her extended family in Istanbul. Due to a mysterious family curse all the men die by age 41, so it is a house of women, among them her beautiful, rebellious mother, Zeliha, clairvoyant Auntie Banu and bar-brawl widow, Auntie Cevriye. But when Asya's Armenian-American cousin Armanoush comes to stay, long-hidden family secrets and Turkey's turbulent past begin to emerge.

Elif Shafak

It will make you think, cry, rage – and hope. It is Elif Shafak at her best

Gloriously expansive and intellectually rich... a magnificent achievement

Richly evocative. A fascinating stream of storytelling.

Engrossing. I turned the pages hungrily, carried by Shafak’s energetic prose and confident that it was heading towards a coherent and rewarding ending. As ever, Shafak did not disappoint.

An absorbing novel. Shafak is a novelist whose interest in mapping the intricately related world and its history goes beyond literary device.

A brilliant, unforgettable novel, which raises big ideas of 'who owns the past' with nuance and complexity. Elif Shafak ties together diverse time periods and places in a way that seems both natural and wonderfully unexpected.

Make place for Elif Shafak on your bookshelf. Make place for her in your heart too. You won't regret it

It will surprise no one that this is a brutal, elegant and incredible book. Amazing what Elif Shafak has done here - again! Magic.

An odyssey, an epic, a lament, and a tale of redemption, There are Rivers in the Sky is a clarion call to honor the elemental forces that shape our memories, our histories, and our world. In short, a masterpiece.

A book that is astonishing, ingenious and beautiful. A modern classic. Elif Shafak is one of the great writers of our time

A deep and satisfying sweep of a story combining intellectual pleasures with a transformative empathy. Particular, universal, with head and with heart in perfect balance, this is surely a landmark novel.

A great, sweeping, enthralling novel - Elif Shafak's narrative vision is as remarkable and astonishing as ever. Wonderful.

Literature on a grand scale, mythic and timeless

There are Rivers in the Sky is an enchanting epic, told through the vantage of single raindrop, where the sacred mysteries of water, science, and poetry collide. In this gorgeous and riverine novel, water is poetry, water is memory. This is a love song to the keepers of our stories and histories, a resounding tribute to the wise women who know the poetry of our rivers. Elif Shafak is one of them—a master storyteller whose prose thrums with such gorgeous details and propulsive spirit, flowing with a keen-eyed wisdom that only she could conjure. I came away feeling restored

Elif Shafak approaches the world with grace, lyricism, and courage. Confronting societies riven by conflicts over gender, religion, sexuality, nationalism, memory, ideology, and more, Shafak wields the novel’s artistic power to cut through complacency and orthodoxy with ruthlessness and beauty. Her words and works—compelling and provocative—leave us in a space of light, a clearing from where we can see this world anew.

If you were going on aesthetics lone, the latest novel from Shafak (above) would make a gorgeous gift purely for its mesmerising blue and gold cover. But its contents are even more dazzling. Sweeping between multiple settings and timelines, from Victorian London to modern-day Turkey, it is a story about the lives of three very different characters who are interconnected by a lost poem and a single drop of water

From its bravura opening through to its final pages, There are Rivers in the Sky is a dazzling achievement. Shafak’s imagination is a wonder: bold, capacious, beautiful and wise.

Elif Shafak's beautiful and moving new novel bears the reader along on its marvellous currents. Here, rivers twine with other rivers and lives with other lives across centuries and cultures, as the fate of a single drop of water weaves an intricate tapestry of love and loss

...dazzling. Sweeping between multiple settings and timelines, from Victorian London to modern-day Turkey, it's a story about the lives of three very different characters who are interconnected by a lost poem and a single drop of water

iPaper - The 30 best books for Christmas 2024

A meditation on family history, memory and sexual awakening

Anger bubbles over into passion - and then a brilliantly executed twist elevates this love story into something much darker. I've been raving about this all year

Intricate, exhilarating storytelling that is a poetic reminder of how connected we are to one another and to the past.

A great epic novel, as swift as a torrent, as deep as an ocean. Elif Shafak at the height of her powers, sweeping us off our feet.

Wide-ranging, eloquent and lavishly detailed, There are Rivers in the Sky expertly draws its various narratives to a powerful climax

There's an elegance to Shafak's storytelling that always draws me, but it is her grit and substance that held me to the last page. Wonderful.

A single raindrop links three narrative threads: Victorian London, where Arthur is obsessed with a lost poem after a visit to the British Museum; the River Tigris in 2014 as Narin flees war with her grandmother; and London in 2018 through the eyes of hydrologist Zaleekhah

One lost poem, two great rivers, three vivid characters from different cultures and times are all united in the ever-changing fate of a single raindrop as it journeys from Victorian London to modern day Turkey in this evocative, immersive epic

If you are a big fan of books that tie together narratives across time, Elif Shafak has written a great one

...in my own stocking I'd love to find Elif Shafak's There Are Rivers in the Sky... it looks like a glorious feast of a novel, from one of the world's most exhilarating storytellers

My novel of the year is Elif Shafak's There Are Rivers in the Sky, a surprising tale of how water connects us all, with a clever cameo role for the British Museum in the 19th century

Daily Express - Closing a chapter on 2024

...Weaving together these three stories with effortless grace, Elif Shafak reminds us she is one of our most evocative storytellers working today. There's an elegance and lyricism to her writing that makes every sentence feel like a work of art. The book is also as intellectually stimulating as it is page-turning; sometimes desperately sad, but often mesmerisingly beautiful

This monumental opus follows a single drop of water as it creates a backdrop not just for otherwise unconnected lives but for a lost epic poem

The Big Issue - Big Issue's top picks of the year

In Victorian London, an extraordinary child is born at the edge of the dirt-black Thames. When his brilliant memory earns him a spot as an apprentice at a printing press, the world opens up far beyond the slums and across the seas.In 2014 in Turkey, Narin, a Yazidi girl living by the River Tigris, waits to be baptized. The ceremony is cruelly interrupted, and soon she and her grandmother must journey across war-torn lands in the hope of reaching the sacred valley of their people.In 2018 in London, broken-hearted Zaleekhah, a hydrologist, moves to a houseboat on the Thames to escape the wreckage of her marriage – until an unexpected connection to her homeland changes everything.A dazzling feat of storytelling from one of the greatest writers of our time, one that spans centuries and continents, this is the story of one lost poem, two great rivers and three remarkable lives – all connected by a single drop of water.

Elif Shafak

Praise for There are Rivers in the Sky

It will make you think, cry, rage – and hope. It is Elif Shafak at her best

Gloriously expansive and intellectually rich... a magnificent achievement

Richly evocative. A fascinating stream of storytelling.

It will make you think, cry, rage – and hope. It is Elif Shafak at her best

Gloriously expansive and intellectually rich... a magnificent achievement

Richly evocative. A fascinating stream of storytelling.

It will make you think, cry, rage – and hope. It is Elif Shafak at her best

Gloriously expansive and intellectually rich... a magnificent achievement

Richly evocative. A fascinating stream of storytelling.

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