The Bastard of Istanbul
The Bastard of Istanbul
paperback
Published:
30 April, 2015
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Description
A gripping and beautiful novel from Elif Shafak, Booker-shortlisted author of The Island of Missing Trees and 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World
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 will change her life, and the lives of everyone around her.
Twenty years later, Asya Kazanci lives with her extended family in Istanbul. A mysterious curse causes all the men to die by the age of 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 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
*** ELIF SHAFAK'S NEW NOVEL, THERE ARE RIVERS IN THE SKY, IS AVAILABLE NOW ***
Prizes
Long-listed for Orange Prize for Fiction.
More Details
| Type | Book |
|---|---|
| ISBN13 | 9780241972908 |
| ISBN10 | 0241972906 |
| Number Of Pages | 368 |
| Item Weight | 257 g |
| Product Dimensions | 130 x 198 x 25 mm |
| Publisher / Reseller | Penguin Books Ltd |
| Format | paperback |
Media Reviews
Unquestionably an ambitious book, exuberant and teeming . . . a novel crammed with characters and themes, not unlike Istanbul itself * Guardian *
Wonderfully magical, incredible, breathtaking . . . will have you gasping with disbelief in the last few pages * Sunday Express *
Heartbreaking . . . the beauty of Islam pervades Shafak's book * Vogue *
A writer whose artistry matches her ambition . . . she has taken on a subject of deep moral consequence * New York Times *
A brave and passionate novel
Tremendous exuberance . . . I do like a writer with a purpose * Margaret Forster *
An astonishingly rich and lively story ... handled with an enchantingly light touch * Kirkus *
Overflows with a kitchen sink's worth of zany characters ... an entertaining and insightful ensemble novel that posits the universality of family, culture and coincidence * Publishers Weekly *
A tender and spirited novel... Steeped in the sights, colours and smells of Turkey's capital, it grapples with the country's dark legacies * NPR Books *
A beautiful book, the finest I have read * Irish Times *
GoodReads Reviews
Author's Bio
Elif Shafak is an award-winning British Turkish novelist, whose work has been translated into fifty-eight languages. The author of twenty books, thirteen of which are novels, she is a bestselling author in many countries around the world. Shafak’s novel 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and the RSL Ondaatje Prize. The Island of Missing Trees was a Sunday Times bestseller, and was shortlisted for the Costa Novel Award and the Women’s Prize for Fiction. There are Rivers in the Sky, which won an Edward Stanford Award for Fiction, is her latest novel.
Shafak holds a PhD in political science, and is a Fellow and a Vice President of the Royal Society of Literature. She has been awarded the medal of Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres and, in 2024, was awarded the British Academy President's Medal for ‘her excellent body of work which demonstrates an incredible intercultural range’.