to the 2015 list

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to the 2015 list

CATALOGUE
2015
FRANKFURT
BOOK FAIR
A&A RIGHTS AGENCY
ASLI BİÇEN
________________________________________________________________________
Aslı Biçen studied English Literature. She is the
co-founder of Book Translators' Union and has
translated the works of many important authors into
Turkish, among them Charles Dickens, William
Faulkner, Lawrence Durrell and John Berger. Her first
work of fiction Hold My Hand was published in 2005.
Snapping Point received the 2009 Book of the Year Award
given by the literature clubs of highschools in Izmir. Her
most recent novel is Threat Letters.
Threat Letters (Tehdit Mektupları)
|Literary Fiction, Metis, 2015 (first ed. 2011), 320 pp.|
“Threat Letters” begins in a court room in the aftermath of a
military coup – the court proceedings in the presence of a
judicial case, threatening letters, the defendant 's diary, letters
written to a lover, and some other unsent letters. The main
character is a teenager that despite sympathizing the left
movement ideals is keeping himself apart but ironically is on
trial for allegedly helping an armed organization. While the
case is in a nationalist prosecutor’s power, the father is
desperately willing that the military coup will bring some
peace in the country.
“Threat Letters” is not only about conscience of human, but also of social
movements and communities.
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Snapping Point (İnceldiği Yerden)
|Literary Fiction, Metis, 2008, 320 pp.|
Aslı Biçen tells us a semi-fantastic story that takes place in an
imaginary town, which "would have been a regular island,
but for that slender connection with the mainland." The story
develops around three main characters, two of them human:
Gentle, mild-mannered grocer Cemal, who spent the past two
decades searching for his missing father around the country,
and Jülide, an orphaned schoolgirl, whose serenity conceals
an extraordinary control over inanimate objects. The third is
the peninsula itself: This peculiar landmass is shaped like a
dual cone, rising to a peak above the town, but unbeknownst
to all, tapering below the waterline, the iceberg of pumice stone anchored by an
equally slender neck.
A bizarre earthquake unexpectedly sets the landmass afloat on the Aegean,
kindling a series of increasingly oppressive measures by the authorities,
ostensibly to keep public order. As the town drifts between Greece and Turkey,
and life becomes ever more intolerable for the inhabitants, Cemal and Jülide
eventually summon their own resolve and join the growing resistance. Even
nature ultimately lends a helping hand, offering a secret underground system
that plays its part in ousting the tyranny. What begins as the realistic tale of a
provincial town develops into a richly detailed political novel in a fantastic
setting.
Biçen's dreamy language weaves a flowing style that transports the reader into
every nook and cranny of Andalıç and into the crystal clear waters of the
Aegean; her metaphors are imaginative, observations insightful, and descriptions
melodious.
Sample translation available in English
Published books:
Hold My Hand (Elime Tutun) – 2005
Snapping Point (İnceldiği Yerden) – 2008
Threat Letters (Tehdit Mektupları) – 2011
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ATİLLA BİRKİYE
_______________________________________________________________________
Born on May 29, 1955, Atilla Birkiye studied
Philosophy at Istanbul University. Since then he has
worked as an editor in publishing houses and on
encyclopaedias and has served on the editorial boards
of several literary magazines. He was appointed
Secretary General of the Union of Turkish Writers,
and has served on the Executive Board of Turkish
Pen. Birkiye’s literary talents have also been exercised
in the broadcasting and performing arts media. As
well as being an essayist and a novelist, Birkiye is also
an accomplished poet - though he personally has never considered himself as such.
Ten Women, One Dream (On Kadın, Bir Hayal)
|Commercial Fiction, Literatür, 2015, 138 pp. |
How many love stories can go in a human life? Did we
remember the lover that feelings didn’t choose to find its
place into ours over time in the autumn of our life… and not
given a kiss, an untouched hand, that we remember when
we look at the sea...
Ten Women, One Dream is a book of dreams and unrequited
love; but also an expressive novel, "forcing" the language.
Our narrator is a man, recalling all his memories in a fallen
city of Dubrovnik about women, that entered his life,
waiting for the "big meeting" and "convergence". He was called by a woman there, than
can come at any moment and while waiting in the pursuit of an unknown Beşir Fuad’s
poetry book...
He fell in love with all of them, but could not find that dreamed love in return, or he just
slipped it from his fingertips.
How many love unrequited love stories can go in a human life?
Moreover, which of them become a novel?
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Meeting Places for Lovers in Istanbul (İstanbul’da Âşıklar İçin Buluşma
Yerleri)
|Non-fiction, Literatür, 2010, 160 pp. |
A fascinating book proposing 34 trysting places for lovers and
would-be lovers. Some of the places are well known, others
hidden away in the less frequented nooks and crannies of
Istanbul. Think of it as a kind of romantic sightseeing tour of the
city. The route - a map of which is thoughtfully provided at the
back of the book - takes us from Taksim, winding its way
around the districts of İstanbul and finally drops us right back
where we started from, at Taksim. Many of the places visited
are illustrated by photographs, others sadly no longer exist;
although once upon a time they were very popular.
Autobiographical musings woven into the text give us a vivid
impression of the places themselves and the associations and
significance they hold for the author. At the end of the book - and completely unrelated
to the rest of the work -Birkiye makes ingenious use of the last page to attach a personal
letter to a woman reader in answer to a question she had asked about his depiction of
the Bosporus Strait in a previous novel – one assumes that he had lost her address!
A Shooting Star (Bir Yıldız Kaydı)
|Fiction, Özgür, 2008, 184 pp. |
A novel, full of coincidences, about a family which runs from
1870’s to present day. Disintegration, especially through and
following the World War I, historical parallelisms of the tragic
events that members of a big family spread to Trabzon and
Batumi, two sister cities founded on the shores of Black Sea in
antiquity undergo; a struggle of survival of a widow, along with
her mother and five kids, in a land where history has changed
and which has witnessed a new revolution. Meanwhile, weaving
of present day relationships with past time sensibilities, and at
times the result surfacing from the depths of the novel… All this
reaching the present, through the “stories told” that many of us
witness in our lives, histories…
Just like most of his other texts, the writer’s revelation of political and sociological
analysis at the depth of this text or between its lines, by using coincidences of daily life.
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BİLGE KARASU
________________________________________________________________________
One of Turkey’s most respected writers, Bilge Karasu, (1930-1995)
published four books of short stories, three novels and four
collections of essays. His first novel Night is the winner of the 1991
Pegasus Literature Award, and English Translation of Karasu’s
The Garden of Departed Cats (New Directions) by Aron Aji was given
the 2004 National Translation Award in the USA. His novella A
Long Day’s Evening was selected to European Society of Author’s
Finnegan’s List of under-translated modern classics.
The Garden of Departed Cats (Göçmüş Kediler Bahçesi)
|Literary fiction, Metis, 2015 (first ed. 1979), 232 pp.|
A surreal, utterly unique novel. In an ancient Mediterranean
city, a tradition is maintained: every ten years an archaic game
of human chess is staged, the players (visitors versus locals)
bearing weapons. This archaic game, the central event of Te
Garden of Departed Cats, may prove as fatal as the deadly
attraction our narrator feels fort the local man who is the
Vizier, or Captain, of the home team. Their “romance” (which,
though inconclusive, magnetizes our protagonist to accept the
Vizier’s challenge to play) provides the skeletal structure of
this experimental novel. Each of their brief interactions works
as a single chapter. And interleaved between their chapters
are a dozen fable-like stories. The folk tale might concern a
13th century herbal that identifies a kind of tulip, a “red
salamander” , which dooms anyone who eats it to never tell a
lie ever again. Or the tale might be an ancient story of a terrible stoat-like creature that
feeds for years on any person it sinks it claws into, like guilt. These strange fables work
independently of the main narrative but, in curious and unpredictable ways (and
reminiscent of Primo Levi’s The Periodic Table), they echo and double its chief themes:
love, its recalcitrance, its cat-like finickiness, and its refusal to be rushed. The Garden of
Departed Cats is a work of peculiar beauty and strangeness, the whole layered and
shiny like a piece of mica.
“Many of the texts from the Middle East that are available in translation are highly political
texts. The Garden of Departed Cats is about a much more basic and at once much larger question,
interactions between the hunter and the hunted. Karasu makes the reader wonder, qyestion and
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doubt the very nature of love and humanity. I found myself revisiting the text over and over
again. Each time I discovered a new layer, a new interpretation and a new depth to this amazing
work by a master word-smith.” Roberta Micallef, AATT Bulletin
“Fascinating... (The Garden of Departed Cats) is an illuminating transitional work between the
work of Turkey’s romantic realist Yaşar Kemal and contemporary postmodernist Orhan Pamuk.
A splendidly lyrical book. More please.”Kirkus Reviews
Translation available in English
Rights sold: English (New Directions), German (Literaturca), Korean (Sigongsa), Peru
(Estruendomudo), Russian (Amphora), Ukrainian (Folio)
A Long Day’s Evening (Uzun Sürmüş Bir Günün Akşamı)
|Literary fiction, Metis, 2014 (first ed. 1970), 232 pp.|
A Long Day's Evening revolves around the relationship
between two 8th century monks. Through these main characters,
Karasu explores the nature of various dualities, including faith
and dogma, new and old, custom and law, truth and lie,
individual and society, East and West, and Byzantium and
Rome. With this novel, Karasu achieves a deft synthesis between
European genre play and local story-telling traditions, paving
the way for an authentically Turkish fiction that exploits the
poetic possibilities of the language and narrative. A Long Day's
Evening was selected to the European Society of Author's
Finnegan's List of under-translated modern classics.
"A Long Day's Evening combines sophisticated philosophical rumination with a storyline that
the reader actually cares about - manages to be both emotionally engaging and intellectually
satisfying."
William Armstrong, Hurriyet Daily News
"Karasu engages interest with prose that is sensual and immediate, combining the tumult of an
inner monologue with the precise, hyperobserved present."
Publishers Weekly
Rights sold: English (City Lights), Greek (Scripta)
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CAN GÜRSES
________________________________________________________________________
Born in Istanbul, she studied Comparative Literature and Film
Studies at The University of Kent and graduated with the second
highest degree. In The University of Edinburgh, she studied
Comparative and General Literature. The subject of her graduation
thesis was to disentangle the east-west and self-other fragmentation
of identity through Amin Maalouf’s Leo the African and Orhan
Pamuk’s The White Castle. Her first novel, En Güzel Günlerini Demek
Bensiz Yaşadın (So You Have Lived The Most Beautiful Days of Your Life
Without Me), which witnesses a family reunion during a dinner through the meals that
are not liked and through the objects that hold the subjective memory of Deryadil
family, was published in February 2014 by Doğan Kitap. She completed her second
novel, Kırık Beyaz (Broken White) in 2013, that has met its reader in April 2015. She is
writing her third novel, Ölüyordum Geçerken Uğradım, (About to Die, Dropped By) which is
about the relationship between sleep, love, time; which is also a century-long portrayal
of Istanbul.
Broken White (Kırık Beyaz)
|Literary fiction, Doğan Kitap, 2015, 216 pp.|
Kırık Beyaz (Broken White) portrays the transformation of innocence
in the hands of a merciless order, a matchless city, and an epical
love. The novel follows the resistance of a human being, who
strives to remain pure, which is only a dream in this world.
Nonetheless, the novel questions the possibility of this dream to
become real.
In 1994, when his village (where Kurds live) has been set alight due
to the scorched earth policy, Kuzgun (meaning, “raven”) leaves his
mother- who departs life- his father -whose life is taken away-, his
nurturing walnut tree, his childhood blanket, his mother earth and
migrates to Istanbul. His childhood keeps him company and
bestows him legendary Emek Movie Theater’s usher Bahtiyar, Taksim -the heart of
Istanbul-, his blooming youth, the sky, cinema, the old hand Çiçek Passage, the wind,
bibliopole Lal Devran’s bookshop in Europe Passage, friendship, the sea, Can Edipsever
-a book beggar-, İstanbul, Smyrna Palace, his oppressive loneliness and mostly, Zambak
(meaning “lily”)- love.
Sample of English translation available
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ÇINAR OSKAY
________________________________________________________________________
Born in 1976 in Istanbul, Çınar Oskay completed the French
language high school Saint Benoit and American University-School
of International Service with a BA in International Relations in
Washington. He started working as a journalist as Foreign News
correspondent at CNN Turk, then moved to the printed media and
worked for several national newspapers. Currently he is the editor in
chief of Hurriyet newspaper supplements.
JUNE – Gezi and the Prime of the City (HAZİRAN – Gezi ve şehrin en
güzel yazı)
| Non-fiction / reportages, Doğan Kitap , 2014, 324 pp.|
More than two years since Gezi protests, and the spirit that will
never loose its value… the most shocking and hottest June of our
lives in Istanbul...
The protests has left an important legacy; a new opposition, new
forms of struggle… And Çınar Oskay collects his interviews
during and after the protests in a book, that invites you to refresh
the memories. And not only from Istanbul, but also from Brazil,
Ankara, Antakya etc.
And many names contributed, as Zeki Demirkubuz, Ihsan
Eliaçık, Murat Belge, Ali Ismail Korkmaz family, who died
during the protests, Roger Waters, Ferzan Ozpetek, Anish
Kapoor, Hasan Bülent Kahraman, Orhan Pamuk, Slovaj Žižek,
Student Collectives, the Association of '68 revolutionaries.
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ERBUĞ KAYA
________________________________________________________________________
Born in Ankara in 1973, Erbuğ Kaya, currently resides in
Istanbul. He attended school at Heybeliada Military High
school and Yıldız Technical University where he studied
Construction Engineering. His growingdissatisfaction with
his field of study, led Kaya to quit his university studies in
pursuit of more fulfilling career opportunities. He has
been awarded the title of MMVP (Microsoft Most Valuable
Player) in this sector a total of four times. In addition to his
remarkable talent as a web design professional, Kaya
displays considerable talent as a writer. “Giddar,” his first
fantasy fiction novel was published by Kalkedon Publishing in 2009. Its sequel,
“Beşlerin Çağı” (The Era of The Five), was published by Ithaki Publishing in
2012. Kaya’s Giddar series receives high praise from critics and was nominated
in 2013 for the GIO awards, organized by Fabisad.
The Fives Era (Beşlerin Çağı)
(Giddar 2)
|fantasy fiction, Ithaki, 2012, 440 pp.|
In Giddar the Sun rised and set thousands of times. This old
land witnessed so many untold secrets, heart-wrenching
disasters and unimaginable glories. Myths of smart, dumb,
good, bad and big ones were buried deep in the history.
Mountains, seas were displaced in the hands of those who
think themselves gods. Hopes , fears, pains were built as a
fine thin cocoon of happiness. And the beginning of the fifth
age began to change a few things. From the very beginning,
children of the gods began to look farther away. At the
beginning of the fifth age, people started rebelling for the first
time against their God.
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Giddar
(Giddar 1)
|fantasy fiction, Kalkedon, 2009, 320 pp.|
Spirits are confined to the darkness of Azad. Zamelgoths are
going North to get back the Scriptures. Those transformed
by the Witch-king are waiting for Dhrazma to wake up from
his sleep. A Southern fighter was mysteriously sent to the
quarry. Arkonians are sworn to silence with a secret, that
they do not even know themselves. Meglions are paying the
price to learn the truth. Taciturns settled with their God
forever. Two brothers pirates have a dream of an island
where there are no gods. In the province Pechnax is trying
to reach the Giddar secret. The Dark Empress shakes
Giddar. shakes A Sheilan woman leaves the country, that
lived in defiance of all beliefs. Dvorlak nuns hammers away in the forest for their
goddess.
A legend of three thousand years begins to flourish again in Giddar, truth is
established… And unaware of them all, Siox Dia Mont is looking to South on the
Freedom Wall.
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ESMAHAN AYKOL
________________________________________________________________________
Esmahan Aykol was born in Edirne, Turkey, 1970, now living in
Berlin and Istanbul. While studying towards a degree in law, she
worked as a journalist for several Turkish newspapers and radio
stations. Later she and a friend opened a bar, which went bust in
no time. Her friend then opened a bookshop and Esmahan Aykol
wrote a novel which became a bestseller not only in that
bookshop, but throughout Turkey: ›Hotel Bosporus‹. Today, she
concentrates solely on writing. She is the creator of the likeable
Kati Hirschel novels, the third of which has just recently been
published. Aykol’s books have been published in 10 languages.
Divorce Turkish Style (Şüpheli Bir Ölüm)
|Crime fiction, Merkez Kitap, 2007, 230 pp.|
Kati owns Istanbul's only mystery book store and, as usual, gets
involved in a case that is none of her business. Every day, a
beautiful woman lunches alone in the restaurant next to the
bookstore. When the woman is found dead in her apartment, Kati
immediately recognizes the stranger from the restaurant in images
in the newspaper photos. Although the police believe it was an
accident, Kati suspects something more sinister has happened.
Sani Ankaraligil was an attractive young woman and a politically
active ecologist in the middle of a divorce from her wealthy
husband. So who would benefit from her death? The industrial
companies Sani had lkoplıkaccused of polluting the rivers of
western Turkey, or her jealous husband seeking revenge through an honor killing, or a
Thracian separatist group? The investigation pulls Kati into murkier waters: the
marriage may have been a sham, designed to cover up Sani's husband's homosexuality .
. . the role of her mother-in-law goes from distasteful to outright criminal.
"Kati could be the love child of Miss Marple and NPR's Andrei Codrescu. It doesn't matter who
done it. What matters is that Aykol uses the genre to tell us more about the world than we're used
to."—Newsday
Rights sold: English (Bitter Lemon Press), German (Diogenes), Italian (Sellerio),
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Hotel Bosphorus (Kitapçı Dükkanı)
∣ Crime Fiction, Merkez Kitap, 2007, 216 pp. ∣
Kati Hirschel, in her thirties, is the proud owner of Istanbul’s only
crime bookshop. When the German director of a film starring an
old school friend is found murdered in his hotel room Kati cannot
resist the temptation to start her own maverick investigation.
After all her friend Petra is the police’s principal suspect and
reading all those detective novels must have taught Kati
something. This is a crime story but also a wonderful book about
Istanbul and Turkish society. It uses humour, social commentary
and even erotic fantasy to expose Western European prejudices
about Turkey as well as Turkish stereotyping of other Europeans.
“Fans of such female detectives as Amanda Cross's Kate Fansler and Kerry Greenwood's Phryne
Fisher will find a lot to like.”
Publishers Weekly
Rights sold: Bulgarian (Colibri); Croatian (Hena); English (Bitter Lemon Press), French
(Buchet-Castel), German (Diogenes); Greek (Kritiki), Hungarian (Ulpius-Haz), Italian
(Sellerio), Macedonian (Antolog), Romanian (Rao), Serbian (Mladinska Knjiga),
Spanish (Roca Editorial)
*Represented by Diogenes Verlag
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FAKİR BAYKURT
________________________________________________________________________
Born in Burdur, Fakir Baykurt worked as a Turkish language
teacher after training at the Gazi Institute of Education. During his
teaching career, he was elected as president of the Turkish Teachers
Union. Fakir Baykurt’s first steps into literature world were in
poetry, but he is mostly known as storyteller and novelist. His first
novel "Revenge of the Snakes" was prosecuted by the state. He died
in 1999.
Awards:
1970 Yunus Nadi Novel Prize (The Revenge of Snakes)
1970 TRT Story Prize (The Dead at the Border)
1971 Turkish Language Institute Novel Prize (Scythe)
1978 Orhan Kemal Novel Prize (Legend of Kara Ahmet)
1984 Berlin Senate Children’s Literature Prize (The Peace Cake)
etc.
Revenge of the Snakes (Yılanların Öcü)
|Fiction, Literatür, 2015 (first ed.1959), 280 pp.|
Karataş is a very beautiful but poor village in Turkey and Kara
Bayram is one of the most poorest residents. He lives in an one
room house, inherited from his father, with his good natured
wife, 3 children and his mother; Irazca, who is a pained and
mournful, but also a tough woman.
And one day, the family peace is broken, as Haceli, supported
by the village headman Cımbıldak Hüsnü decides to build a
house in front of theirs. Naturally, Irazca stands up to him and
sparks fly in the village...
Fakir Baykurt's novel is about cheap opportunism in rural places
and corrupts running after it. Also, their bureaucracy extents,
destroying the future of bright and beautiful people.
Endemic, but also very universal!
German translation available
Rights sold: TV series rights
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The Turtles (Kaplumbağalar)
∣ Fiction, Literatür, 2014 (first ed.1967), 368 pp. ∣
Tozak is village in a forgotten corner of the world. It is like poor
man’s quilt with a thousand patches, arid and neglected. The
village people are today’s peasants, who stil say “Our government
knows the best!”. Still expecting help from the state, uneducated,
vulgar but also hard working, realistic and honest. The day comes
when the teacher Rıza, headman Battal and the clever madman
Gray Abbas come together, think, organize the people and work
day and night to build a vineyard on a stony field… “The Turtles”
touches on the problems engraved in our memories, but which stil
exist today. Written in a plain, but rich language, it is a genuine
and bright literary work, as much a story about creative villagers, as about their despair
and cluelessness in the face of the bureaucracy.
Rights sold: Film rights
Backlist rights previously sold to:
Sakarca – Georgian; German; Hungarian; The Revenge of Snakes – Georgian; Russian;
Irazca’s Peace – Bulgarian; Anatolian Garage – English;
All rights reverted!
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GÖKTUĞ CANBABA
________________________________________________________________________
Born in Ankara, in which he completed his primary and secondary
education, he graduated from Publishing department of Anadolu
University in 2006. He participated numerous photography
exhibitons in many cities in the country. He took photographs for a
long time for the literary magazine “Patika”. Following his
long-term trip to Thailand and Nepal, he worked on personal
photo projects and founded a photography company.
The Cat in the Suitcase (Valizdeki Kedi)
|Children Fiction, Doğan Kitap, 2015, 212 pp.|
Kiki is a house cat and she lives in an apartment on the top
floor of building with a Galata Tower view. Her greatest
pleasure is to sleep soundly in her cozy nest. She doesn’t know
the outside world at all… Until one day when she fall asleep in
the suitcase of her family, preparing for a holiday. When she
opens her eyes and finds herself at the airport in Paris, Kiki is
puzzlied what to do. The streets are so strange to her and she
doesn’t have the slighest idea how to get back home. When
Kiki starts exploring her surroundings, she meets the little
mouse Toro and thanks to it she embarks on an adventure, that
will never forget. In Kiki's fun-filled story you will witness the
power of friendship, solidarity and love.
All rights available
Other titles:
The Missing Light of the Lantern Fish (Fener Balığının Kayıp Işığı)
Amulet Power (Tılsım-ı Kudret)
The Poet’s Song (Ozanın Şarkısı)
Peeing Hawk (İşeyen Atmaca
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İSMAİL GÜZELSOY
________________________________________________________________________
Born in 1963 in Iğdır, he grew up in Istanbul and studied
at the Mass Media and Communication department of
Istanbul University. From 1984 to 1987 he lived in
Sweden and studied Swedish. His short stories and
essays appeared in several magazines. Güzelsoy’s books
have been published by highly regarded presses such as
İletişim, Everest and Dogan Kitap. Güzelsoy’s stories
were included in the anthology of the University of
Copenhagen Middle East Literature Fair in 2006 and of “Turkische Erzahlungen des 20.
Jahrhunderts” Frankfurt Book Fair in 2008. In the same year a translation of his story
“Ateşin Dili” was included in a Noir anthology published by Akashic Publishing (US).
Novels
2000, Kitab-ı Mukadder, İletişim Yayınları
2004, Ruh Hastası, İletişim Yayınları
2005, Sincap, Everest Yayınları
2006, Rukas, Everest Yayınları
2007, İyi Yolculuklar, Everest Yayınları
2010, Değil Efendi’nin Renk ve Korku Meselleri, Doğan Yayıncılık
2011, Çıt Yok, Mephisto Kitaplığı
2015, Değmez, Doğan Kitap
Non-fiction
2009, İstanbul’un Gezi Rehberi, (2 volumes), Alfa Yayınları
Unworthy (Değmez)
|Literary Fiction, Doğan Kitap, 2015, 376 pp.|
A man lies under the ice sheet of a river, down at the bottom: a man of
letters. Faruk Ferzan. "What happened to me? Am I dead?" he asks
himself... Is he dead? If not, someone has to save him. He needs to
move on. If love deserves to be lived, he must do it...
The author charms the reader with a sleight of hand and captivates
with spells.. Ismail Güzelsoy puts on a stage the two biggest secrets of
life – the dance of love and death. For those that keep their belief in the
magic of literature...
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Pure (Saf)
∣ Fiction, Doğan Kitap, 2011, 342 pp. ∣
“Pure” is based on the journey of a naive young Shaman... The
protagonist, who has received special training, joins a commercial
caravan in order to reach Samarkand and find the “sacred toy”. Subala
is a naive young man who doesn’t even know how to shake hands or
form a complete sentence. The novel opens as a classical fairy tale. It
contains all of the elements of a fairy tale. Indeed it is a lovely, warm
and enthusiastic love story. But the reader soon learns that this is not a
warm and naive world. Neither Subala nor the world are naive. The
antichrist has descended and the plague is rampant. Caravans are
attacked and travelers are massacred. Then we see that Subala has acquired a different
persona. As a shaman he stands before god and asks that the carnage be stopped.
Subala is able to put people to sleep when he plays his Chinese fiddle, Erhu, after which
he robs them. However, in the midst of so much murder, robbery and the plague he
begins using his talent to help people rather than rob them. Thus the novel explores the
nature of purity and naiveté. It is not something one is born with but something that is
acquired through effort. In the course of the novel Güzelsoy attempts to understand and
explain the Cult of Zero. Thus Saf is an attempt to redefine shamanism.
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LUDMILA FILIPOVA
________________________________________________________________________
She was born on Easter 1977. She graduated with a bachelor’s
degree from the Economic University Sofia and from the City
University with an MBA in general management. Ludmila
specialized in Creative writing (fiction) at Oxford University in
2009. She is one of Bulgaria’s most popular contemporary
authors. Filipova works as a TV presenter in one of the most
popular TV talk shows at the national bTV called High Hills.
She is also a columnist for the most popular Bulgarian
newspaper 24 Hours. Years ago she worked as an editor in
chief of Media&Marketing magazine and as a journalist for BusinessWeek Bulgaria.
www.ludmilafilipova.com
A Journey to the World's End
|Travelogue, Egmont, 2015, 320 pp.|
They say that important events in life happen when you are ready for them.
That every offset begins with the first step…
What is a beginning, and where does the end lie? Who sets the
borders on the planet we inhabit? What about the confines within
us? Where does our world begin and end? Antarctica is the last
pristine continent on Earth, the last place where nature has
managed to survive the way it was before us. What does this still
mystical and extremely cold place look like? What secrets does it
hold? Why is it of such importance for the future of humanity?
The writer Ludmila Filipova departs on a distant, filled with
hardships and deprivations journey to find the answers to these
and many other questions. Her aim is to get acquainted with the
continent’s secrets and share them with us.
This is a journey to one’s self and the understanding of what does it mean to be human.
It is a way of discovering one’s unsuspected strength and abilities. This is Antarctica
through her eyes and lens – so close, and yet so distant, the Antarctica we all carry
within ourselves.
“We were all just part of the moment – facts, colors and dust blowing in the wind. The
end of the world would come whenever we accepted it. Our abilities were only as grand
as our
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self-confidence. Every beginning was where we overcame ourselves, experienced every
moment, felt every breath. The end, the true End, might never come, if that was what we
willed.”
This is a bilingual publication, with text in English and Bulgarian.
The Parchment Maze
|Suspense thriller, Ciela, 2009, 426 pp.|
While studying similarities between Christianity and Thracian
Orphism, archeologist Vera Kandilova stumbles across
perplexing symbols tied to a prehistoric Balkan civilization that
mysteriously disappeared thousands years ago and a secret
hidden deep in the Devil’s Throat cave in the Rhodope
Mountains. What begins as a purely academic scavenger hunt
across Germany, Russia, Italy and Bulgaria leads her to frescoes
in the Roman catacombs, a medieval Orpheus amulet,
prehistoric clay vessels and ultimately to a cryptic manuscript
called The Parchment Maze. The intellectual puzzle quickly
gets visceral – after a series of murders, thefts of valuable
artifacts and a kidnapping, the clues show Vera the path to
uncovering the secret of the legendary incorporeal ones – those who jealously guard the
most ancient knowledge from humanity and grant insight only to enlightened
individuals such as Jesus, Enoch, Dante and Orpheus. Their secrets have been sought
over the centuries by powerful scientists and politicians, including Hitler, numerous
popes, secret services and military organizations.
The Parchment Maze by the Bulgarian writer Ludmila Filipova is an archival suspense
thriller, which topped national best-seller lists for years and which is currently in its
sixth reprinting. In 2012, National Geographic made a film based on the book and
featuring the author, entitled Sword in the Stone & the Orpheus Amulet. The novel
combines an intellectual puzzle structure with real archeological evidence plus a healthy
jolt of fantasy.
Rights sold: Romanian (Rao)
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MAHİR ÖZTAŞ
________________________________________________________________________
Born in 1951 and one of the original voices of modern
Turkish literature, has been publishing poems, short stories,
and novels for more than thirty years. He graduated in
architecture from the Academy of Fine Arts in Istanbul, a
career that took him to Saudi Arabia, through Europe, Asia,
and North Africa. He now devotes his full time to writing.
His first book was Unutulmak Tozlari ( “Dust of
Forgottenness,” 1983), a collection of poems. A book of
stories, Ay Gozetleme Komitesi (“Committee for Moon
Watching,” 1987) followed, and won the 1988 Sait Faik Short
Story Award. His 1989 collection Korku Oyunu (“Game of Fear ” ) won the Yunus Nadi
Short Story Award, and the novel Soguma (“Cooling Off,” 1995) won the novel award
from the same foundation. He participated courtesy of the Grace Piercy Fellowship.
mahiroztas.com
Nourishing a Desire
∣ Literary Fiction, YKY, 2014 (first ed.2002), 284 pp. ∣
Mahir Öztaş is one of the original voices of contemporary
Turkish literature. This is a novel depicting a search: in his first
novel The Chill, Öztaş had written about a lost writer and a
researcher in his trails; in Nourishing a Desire his main
character is an artist who tries to solve a murder. Reminiscent of
Thomas Bernhard’s style, the narrative takes numerous turns
and lights upon cities like Glasgow, San Francisco, and New
Orleans, upon Balthus and the art circles in İstanbul, writers
and pseudo-writers, loves and fake loves, malevolence and
compassian, losers and survivors. The narrator of the novel remembers his past for three
days – he had left İstanbul eleven years ago, living for four years in Glasgow and then
seven years in New York. His reminiscence takes him back to İstanbul, to his days at the
academy of fine arts, his friends and the conversations he had with them, the women
and the places he loved, and his friend who was murdered. All these intertwine to lead
him to a deeper understanding of himself. Nourishing a Desire is a novel to lose oneself
in.
English sample translation available
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MENEKŞE TOPRAK
________________________________________________________________________
Menekşe Toprak (b. 1970 in Kayseri) is a Turkish writer,
freelance journalist and radio programmer. After completing
his primary and secondary education in Ankara and Cologne,
she graduated from the Faculty of Political Sciences, Ankara,
Turkey. She lives between Berlin and Istanbul since 2002. Her
first stories book ―Valizdeki Mektup‖ was published in 2007
by YKY Publishing. Her stories took part at magazines as
Kitaplık, Notos Öykü, Özgür
Edebiyat and anthologies as ―Istanbul in Women Stories‖ and
―Ankara in Women Stories‖. Her stories were also translated into German and appeared
at 20th Century Turkish Stories Anthology (Türkische Erzählungen des 20 Jahrhunderts
Suhrkampverlag). She has two stories books and two novels published.
The End of the Elegy (Ağıtın Sonu)
|Fiction, İletişim, 2014, 230 pp.|
*Winner of Duygu Asena Novel Prize 2015
Fatma is a 36-year old Kurdish-Alevite woman raised in her
uncle’s house in a poor neighborhood. Her father was killed by
right-wing guerillas during the clash between the leftists and
nationalists in early 1980s in Turkey. Her mother re-married, but
the new husband didn’t accept Fatma into the home. Growing up
in her uncle’s household, the only opportunity for Fatma was to
receive a good education. Smart and diligent, she succeeds.
The novel opens with a chance encounter between Kerem and
Fatma on an Istanbul island, where she is stranded during a
sou’wester storm. Kerem stokes her homesickness and longing for
a sense of place.
The End of the Elegy starts out as a love story, but the reader soon
confronts the isolating culture of urban mega-centers. Istanbul is changing rapidly, as
neighborhoods are demolished for the sake of urban transformation. Relationships
between men and women are riddled with mistrust, and Fatma and Kerem have no
more than a one-night stand. Love—the thing she yearns and hopes for from this
relationship—isn’t in the cards. Indeed, many of the women around Fatma are going
through the same thing. In a society stuck and directionless between traditional (Islamic)
and Western cultures, the modern woman is either sexually exploited or lonely.
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July Children (Temmuz Çocukları)
∣ Fiction, İletişim, 2015 (first ed. YKY, 2011), 253 pp. ∣
What would I do if I were a different person… ―, asks the young
Aysu. She writes her thoughts in a notebook. The first part of the
novel is preceded by the leitmotif ―Speak, Memory‖, where Aysu
recalls her childhood in two countries, on two continents. Part of it
was here, and the other spent part there.
Her family lives in, or rather between two cultures, Germany and
Anatolia. It is a disruption not only of feelings and thought, but even
reality. Two of the four children of the aging couple live in Cologne,
two in Ankara. Aysu was initially taken as a child from his parents
to Germany, only a few years later sent back to Turkey to spend
most of her childhood without parents.
The novel is not only a book about migrant stories, it’s about loneliness and fear, home
and distance, separation and union, bondage and freedom. The brilliant narration of
details and characterization gives fascination and strength to the novel. The reader will
touch a world that may only seem strange, but soon to be trusted. The author does not
accuse, does not count on, does not want to explain – she is simply, brutally frank and
sincere.
Sample translation available in German
Rights sold: Italian (Magmata);
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MURAT UYURKULAK
________________________________________________________________________
Murat Uyurkulak was born in 1972 in Aydın. A university
dropout, Uyurkulak worked as a waiter, technician, translator,
journalist and publisher. His first novel Tol: Bir İntikam
Romanı/Tol: A Revenge Novel was published in 2002. Tol was
adapted for the theater and has enjoyed a long and successful
run. His other books are Har: Bir Kıyamet Romanı (Har: An
Apocalyptic Novel) and Bazuka (Bazooka) (short stories).
Har – An Apocalyptic Novel (Har – Bir Kıyamet Romanı)
∣ Literary Fiction, Metis, 2015 (first ed. YKY, 2006), 256 pp. ∣
"There is no fantastical dimension to Har. This country and this
planet with their suffering, oppressions, injustices and obsessions
are fantastic enough already. Perhaps all I did was to try and
transform that fantasy into some sort of reality in Har. In a
country where 12-year-old children are shot with thirteen bullets
and stigmatized as „terrorists‟, where civil servants who wouldn‟t
accept a kilo of onions for fear of bribery are clubbed by the police
in city squares while big time murderers and thieves are
considered to be heroes, and in a world where what‟s happening
is at least as bizarre as these, I would flop at creating fantasy."
– Murat Uyurkulak
A sharp allegorical fantasy brimming with irony, Har narrates the stories of those who
fail to forget in a land where no one remembers the past. These hidden heroes of the
novel, the "crooked," are so by virtue of the many blows they received from history: war
(civil war), poverty, belatedness, earthquake, population exchange…
The second novel by the author of Tol which won wide critical acclaim, Har has been
received with similar enthusiasm.
"In a sense, Murat Uyurkulak’s novel has refreshing bits of hope. As the masters sleep
comfortably thinking that they incinerated all the crazy ones, a soft lullaby interrupts in the
darkest, quietest night…" Nazan Maksudyan, Virgül, July-August 2006
"Each section in the novel begins with a quote from an Anatolian elegy, and we soon realize that
the novel itself is a sort of elegy. We begin to understand that even though a generation only
learns
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about what the previous generation has gone through by ‘eavesdropping’ and not via books, what
has happened a long time ago still holds power over the lives of individuals today." Aysel Sağır,
Cumhuriyet Kitap Eki, 10 August 2006
Translation available in German
Rights sold: German (Binooki);
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Tol – A Revenge Story (Tol – Bir İntikam Romanı)
∣ Literary Fiction, Metis, 2015 (first ed. YKY, 2002), 264 pp. ∣
50.000 copies sold
“Best novel of the last 10 years in Turkish literature” by Radikal book supplement
The long train journey of two “defeated and exhausted”
characters, once targets of the sweeping rage of the state and
thus both marked with the brutal side of the country‟s recent
history. The Poet, a ‟68 political activist, and Yusuf, a red diaper
child of the coup d‟état, embark on an intoxicated and
tormenting process of settling accounts with history, society and
themselves. Meanwhile outside the train, all over the country,
bombs are set off by an “unknown power”, destroying the most
prominent official institutions and buildings that represent big
money, state terrorism and oppression. When The Poet and
Yusuf arrive at the last station, they step out onto a land where
“the revolution is once again probable”. In a fascinating move,
this “revenge novel” extends its vengeance on to the language itself, creatively
destroying laws of syntax, semantics and vocabulary.
"The author hangs out of the frenetic darkness of mercy, infinity of the wild, bestiality of
deprivation, and at that very moment of horror you see him falling, you encounter with the novel.
Uyurkulak stands in our way with that unique courage of the great people of literature."
Yıldırım Türker
Translation available in German and French
Rights sold: French (Galaade); German (Unionsverlag); Italian (Passigli Editore);
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MUSTAFA KUTLU
________________________________________________________________________
Born in 1947 in Erzincan. After completing his studies, he
started teaching on Turkish literature. He has contributed to
various literary periodicals since 1968 and currently works
as an editor of chief of Dergah Literature, Art, Culture
Magazine. Kutlu’s stories mark a climax in modern Turkish
literature. He has a simple and enchanting language
following Anatolian anecdote tradition. Along with short
stories and essays, he also writes scripts for cinema and
television films and produces TV shows. He is columnist for
a prominent Turkish newspaper. His works with 300.000 of
sold copies in Turkey have been translated into many
languages.
Awards:
• Best Story Writer Award 1981 by Writers Union of Turkey
• Best Story Writer Award 1983 by Writers Union of Turkey
• Language Award for A Long Story (Uzun Hikâye) 2000 by Writers Union of Turkey
A Long Story (Uzun Hikaye)
∣ Novella, Dergah, 2015 (first ed. 2000), 115 pp. ∣
Ali is a young and boisterous man who just keeps on smiling and
takes whatever life throws at him. At heart he is a drifter, but his life
principles are manifest in his rebellious attitude towards injustice and
fairness. This attitude, we learn, gets him into constant trouble with
the state authorities, as such he drags along his family from one
Anatolian town to the next once one authority figure or the other
deems his aspirations of equality as “communism.”
When a fatal accident takes away the lovely Münire from the life of
Ali and Mustafa, the father and son decide to continue their limbo
existence. But of course the young Mustafa finally begins to see what
kind of a person his father might really be: An honest and loving man who indeed
stands by his principles and raises his voice against his repressors but never really takes
the full step of protest. Ali’s perception of life is more in line with humanism and
survivalism than that of political activism. And perhaps this is why Mustafa begins to
have a hard time forgiving his father.
Rights sold: Azeri (Qanun); German (Binooki); Malaya (ITMB);
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NİHAN KAYA
________________________________________________________________________
Nihan Kaya (b. 1979) began publishing in literary journals in
1999. As an undergraduate, she studied English Literature at
Boğaziçi University and then completed an MA programme at
the Centre for Psychoanalytic Studies at the University of
Essex, UK. Psychology always remained the most significant
element of her fiction. The subject of her doctoral dissertation
(Comparative Literature programme at King's College London)
was involved with Jungian psychology as much as literary
creativity and its energy. With her second book, The Garret,
Kaya was awarded with 'the best book of the year' award in the category of short story
by the Writers Union of Turkey (Türkiye Yazarlar Birliği) in 2005. Kaya still holds the
title of being the youngest writer who has ever been awarded the TYB Award. Kaya's
books are being studied in various Turkish literature courses at universities and several
Master's thesis have been done on her novels.
Courage to Write (Yazma Cesareti)
∣ Non Fiction, Ayrıntı, 2015 (first ed. 2013), 272 pp. ∣
The Courage to Write is a reference to Rollo May’s The Courage to
Create. In his wonderful book, Rollo May was discussing creativity.
Nihan Kaya focuses on literary creativity among all other ways of
creativity, in her book.
What sort of a courage is the courage to write, depending on Rollo
May’s description of the courage to create? What is a created text and
what is it not? Could we talk about a criterion to assess creativity in a
text? Why is creativity necessarily a non-conformist action? Why do
we read and write; and what is the use of literature?
Nihan Kaya calls us to ponder these questions not only with reference to art theories, but
also in a sincere manner as a creative writer herself. For those of us who have the
courage to read…
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The Hidden Self (Gizli Özne)
∣ Fiction, Dergah, 2006, 230 pp. ∣
A silent home of an old couple who mourn for their son. In comes a
woman (Revna) who introduces herself as the fiancée of their son.
Before long she endears herself to the family. The mystery shrouding
her past is heightened by the riddle woven around their son’s death.
Then, recollections flash from two different pasts of two women, the
dead man's mother and lover. A pair of stories that flank the entire
novel from two different wings, sparked off by the scent of white
coffee, will create havoc in the quiet atmosphere of the dormant house
in a deafening crescendo, collide into each other, intertwine, and then
get reborn as a single voice, before dying down in perfect harmony.
The Hidden Self is composed of chapters narrated by two sequential voices, that of Revna,
and of another narrator who tells the story of Bihter. Recollections of Revna suffer
occasional blackouts whenever a group of leitmotifs crop up as the novel progresses. We
sense the hint that Revna has a secret: As a two-year-old, she was found with the body of
her dead mother whose identity could never be revealed. She had spent days with the
corpse. As Revna turns towards her lost past, with the force of her fiancee / future, it
turns out that some part of her present story is indeed illusional. This discovery leads to a
radical change in the reader’s outlook on the whole plot.
In an entirely different world, Bihter, a gifted girl born into a well-off family, suffers from
incomprehension, as she prefers to stick to her alien world. The anonymous narrator of
Bihter’s account is a baffling puzzle. There is a serious struggle between her and Bihter.
The narrator is alternately befriended, scolded, locked up by Bihter. As events evolve, we
realize that the narrator is indeed Bihter herself. However, she objects to this idea,
claiming that a new self was born out of Bihter through motherhood.
The Hidden Self displays the drama of integration and self-discovery as experienced by
two women from opposite backgrounds. Whilst Bihter resists against integration, Revna,
ashamed of her uncommon origins, longs for it. Concepts such as family, society, past,
future have very different meanings in the personal matrix of these two women.
However, in the end, both characters will find a way to compromise with society, which
also means a compromisation with their own self. Now, they have lost this bond together.
Rights sold: Bulgarian (Aviana);
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NURDAN GÜRBİLEK
________________________________________________________________________
A foremost cultural critic in Turkey, Nurdan Gürbilek is the
author of Living in a Shop Window, an analysis of the cultural
dynamics of the 1980s in Turkey. Her other publications include
Shifting Shadow and Homework, collections of essays on modern
Turkish writers. After Bad Boy Turk, an analysis of the significant
images and tropes in modern Turkish literature and popular
culture, she published Orient Lost, which explores the sexual
anxieties
accompanying
the
Ottoman-Turkish
literary
modernization, and Language of the Downtrodden, which deals
with Dostoyevsky’s “underground tragedy” and its counterparts
in modern Turkish litterature. Her most recent book is Someone
Before Me, 2011.
The New Cultural Climate in Turkey, Living in a Shop Window
(Vitrinde Yaşamak)
|Non-fiction, Metis, 2010, 224 pp.|
The essays on Turkishness and evil explore the sinister cultural
climate of 1990s and 200s when efforts to redefine Turkish identity
predominated the cultural scene. Gürbilek takes as her point of
departure some significant images and tropes in modern Turkish
literature and popular culture: arabesque songs, the figure of the
snob in Turkish novel, the death of a porn star, the child hero
archetype in urban popular culture... With utmost care and justice
she weaves these into a keen understanding of their cultural
significance, exploring Turkishness not as a autonomous and
essentialist local truth but rather as an impasse always already
shaped in relation to modern world, as a double-bind that has produces oppositional
sentiments in the cultural sphere. This is where the desire to be other coincides with fear
of losing one’s self in the other, and the feeling of inadequacy is concurrent with a reflex
of self-defense. And evil here has to do with the unleashing of all things dark and
sinister when the liberal promise fails to deliver, when the shop windows cease to dazzle
and the struggle for livelihood turns bitter in urban wilderness.
Rights sold: English (Zed)
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ONUR CAYMAZ
________________________________________________________________________
Poet, short story writer and novelist Onur Caymaz was born in 1977
and completed a degree in Electronics Computers at Marmara
Technical University. He works for an international advertising agency
as a copy editor. His writings have appeared in some of Turkey‟s most
prestigious literary journals. He writes about the resilience of people
living in big cities confronted by contemporary values and difficult
conditions. His characters are young individuals who remain clean
and pure despite the filth of the world and are torn between loves and
the dilemmas imposed by their political identities.
Poems:
„Sometimes and Its Colour‟ 2000, „Look You‟re Still Beautiful‟ 2004, „Summer Prices‟ 2009
Stories:
„Dreamfairiesistanbul‟ 1999, „The Book of Crushed Lilacs‟ 2003, „As if Tomorrow is
April‟ 2005, „All the Needs of the Heart and Complexion‟ 2008
Novels:
„The Stars that Remind You‟ 2004, „Night Beauty‟ 2010
Zero (Sıfır)
∣ To be published, Literary fiction, Spring 2016 ∣
Herostratos wakes up in the morning and begins telling us some stories. But he is so
excited... It‟s a summer morning in Istanbul. The city is waiting for the Nazis, that will
possibly occupy it and starting from Istanbul they will keep spreading around... Time has
come.
This is how Zero starts. All chapters are in a darkness; the darkness of the night, right
before dawn. And the most repeated word in the book is "dark". Nothing is clear in the
dark, we always need a little more light. Moreover, the light is not enough; the light has
to be reflected back to the eye.
Each line of the book sprints to reach back the beginning of the novel, when Herostratos
wakes up in the morning. As a “zero”, all will return to the start. But when the circle is
complete, everything will eventually turn into the unknown... Zero is about dinner
menus in the Nazi camps, the first heroin factories in Istanbul, the bizarre smiles of the
capital owners, exhibited at wax museums, the back streets of Istanbul, the pale children
of East Germany when the Berlin wall was destroyed, Ankara at the coup d‟etat and
years after the murder of 7 young leftist activists.Historical, encyclopaedic, fantastic and
anticapitalist... For those who fall under the spell of narration...
All rights available
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ÖZLEM KUMRULAR
________________________________________________________________________
She was born in 1974 in Istanbul. Graduated from Bogazici
University, Department of Western Languages and Literatures,
she completed her master degree at the Department of History
at the same university and postgraduated degree at the
University of Salamanca in Spain. She worked on XVI.
Century Euro- Mediterranean and Ottoman history. She is
currently a lecturer at Bahcesehir University.
The Sultan’s Kitchen (Sultan’ın Mutfağı)
∣ Doğan Kitap, Fiction, 2010, 486 pp. ∣
What would happen if the recently discovered fruits, vegetables and
other exotic food were to end up in the Sultan’s kitchen in 1574? How
would the staff working in the imperial kitchen react against such an
astonishing and unexpected visit? What would happen if the four chefs
of the kitchen of the Topkapı Palace were from different religious sects
and believed in different Gods in different ways? How would they
express their view of life, their beliefs and raison d’êtres in the exquisite
dishes that they prepared for the Sultan?
All different sects, nationalities and personalities melt in the same pot:
The imperial kitchen becomes a place where there is only one God for all,
where no religious identity can seperate an individual from the other.
The kitchen is represented as a common place of peace, creation, fun and belief. They
question the notion and the existence of God together through humour. They modestly
make fun of the religious dogmas in an unoffensive way.
They also exchange their supersititions. When they cannot find the ultimate solution in
their own religion, they refer to the religion of the other to find a way out. Muslims
celebrating the Agious Fanouros feast, Christians trying to find their path
throughistihare (the guidance of God through dreams), etc. The funniest things happen
meanwhile. The religion is brought to the terrestial level from a celestial one.
Sample of Spanish translation available
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STELLA ACIMAN
________________________________________________________________________
Stella Aciman was born in Istanbul in 1953. She studied
Business Administration at Istanbul University. She worked as
operating manager in different enterprises and also as a director
of music programs for the radio. Currently she lives in Northern
Cyprus. Her other novels are Bella (2002) and Kırlangıçların
Ömrü (2003).
Ask Thy Mother – Remember The Days of Old
With Feyza Howell
∣ To be published, Fiction, Spring 2016 ∣
Two Turkish women writers –a Jew and a Gentile- join efforts to pay tribute to an
audacious young country risen from the ashes of a dying empire as they relate a
fictionalised account of a Jewish woman’s lifestory. Reform follows war follows political
and economic turmoil in the young Republic of Turkey, an environment where Jew and
Greek and Armenian and Turk all celebrate one another’s festivals in polyphonic
harmony. As family fortunes rise and fall and she charts her own course into young
adulthood, Brana learns that not even a tightly knit community is free from prejudice.
A nation that had embraced exiled Jews 450 years previously inexplicably turns its back
upon a shipload of refugees even as its diplomats risk everything to rescue their fellow
human beings from the Holocaust at the other end of the continent. Social upheaval and
political injustice elicits extremes: decent people shelter their neighbours from harm
whilst the covetous use any excuse to plunder others’ property. The decades of triumphs
and tribulation concealed behind the inscrutability of our parents might always remain a
mystery unless we ask; they may never freely share their stories with us.
Ask Thy Mother encourages the reader to do just that in a novel that is impossible to put
down.
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