'𝑭𝒐𝒓 𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒓𝒚 𝒅𝒊𝒔𝒑𝒍𝒂𝒄𝒆𝒅 𝒑𝒆𝒓𝒔𝒐𝒏 𝒖𝒏𝒅𝒆𝒓𝒔𝒕𝒂𝒏𝒅𝒔 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒖𝒏𝒄𝒆𝒓𝒕𝒂𝒊𝒏𝒕𝒚 𝒊𝒔 𝒏𝒐𝒕 𝒕𝒂𝒏𝒈𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒊𝒂𝒍 𝒕𝒐 𝒉𝒖𝒎𝒂𝒏 𝒆𝒙𝒊𝒔𝒕𝒆𝒏𝒄𝒆 𝒃𝒖𝒕 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒗𝒆𝒓𝒚 𝒆𝒔𝒔𝒆𝒏𝒄𝒆 𝒐𝒇 𝒊𝒕.'

'𝑻𝒉𝒂𝒕'𝒔 𝒘𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒉𝒂𝒑𝒑𝒆𝒏𝒔 𝒘𝒉𝒆𝒏 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒍𝒐𝒗𝒆 𝒔𝒐𝒎𝒆𝒐𝒏𝒆 – 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒄𝒂𝒓𝒓𝒚 𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒊𝒓 𝒇𝒂𝒄𝒆 𝒃𝒆𝒉𝒊𝒏𝒅 𝒚𝒐𝒖𝒓 𝒆𝒚𝒆𝒍𝒊𝒅𝒔, 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒊𝒓 𝒘𝒉𝒊𝒔𝒑𝒆𝒓𝒔 𝒊𝒏 𝒚𝒐𝒖𝒓 𝒆𝒂𝒓𝒔, 𝒔𝒐 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒏 𝒊𝒏 𝒅𝒆𝒆𝒑 𝒔𝒍𝒆𝒆𝒑, 𝒚𝒆𝒂𝒓𝒔 𝒍𝒂𝒕𝒆𝒓, 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒄𝒂𝒏 𝒔𝒕𝒊𝒍𝒍 𝒔𝒆𝒆 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝒉𝒆𝒂𝒓 𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒎 𝒊𝒏 𝒚𝒐𝒖𝒓 𝒅𝒓𝒆𝒂𝒎𝒔.'


This is my fourth Elif Shafak, and possibly my favourite so far.

Weaving together three stories across hundreds of years with the history of a small area of Mesopotamia at its centre, Shafak has created another monumental historical epic. 

As always the prose in this is divine. Shafak's writing is pure poetry to me and yet still approachable and readable and well paced.

She creates nuanced, thoughtful characters who, while they embody the themes and ideas she is trying to carry (possibly too many in this one?) they are not overwhelmed by those themes and are not mere signifiers for an idea. They feel organic and spontaneous in creation. 

I loved these stories, and the ideas that they carried. I came away feeling small and insignificant but also strangely comforted. Shafak deals with some tough subjects here and at times this was a really difficult thing to read because it felt so well researched that I felt I was reading real accounts of the Yazidi genocide.

As with all Shafak - I felt pulled to some POVs more than others and I tend to find I prefer Shafak writing about the past rather than the modern era (though I adored Narin's POV, it didn't feel remotely modern in tone). I also felt there were a lot of ideas in this and it felt overwhelming to pull it altogether, though by the end it felt more cohesive as a whole piece.

A beautiful novel, that richly deserves all the praise it has received.