Elif Shafak

"A rich, magical new novel on belonging and identity, love and trauma, nature and renewal, from the Booker-shortlisted author of 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World. Two teenagers, a Greek Cypriot and a Turkish Cypriot, meet at a taverna on the island they both call home. In the taverna, hidden beneath garlands of garlic, chili peppers and creeping honeysuckle, Kostas and Defne grow in their forbidden love for each other. A fig tree stretches...

Traces the parallel stories of a present day Massachusetts, unhappily married professional reader, Ella Rubinstein's inspiration of the story of Shams of Tabriz, and her own transformation, and, the 13th-century transformation of a successful but unhappy cleric, Rumi, into a mystic and poet. Shafik blends the East and the West, past and present, and presents an account of how love works in the world.

"From the acclaimed author of The Bastard of Istanbul, a colorful, magical tale set during the height of the Ottoman Empire In her latest novel, Turkey's preeminent female writer spins an epic tale spanning nearly a century in the life of the Ottoman Empire. In 1540, twelve-year-old Jahan arrives in Istanbul. As an animal tamer in the sultan's menagerie, he looks after the exceptionally smart elephant Chota and befriends (and falls for) the sultan's...

A short story by Elif Shafak from the collection Reader, I Married Him: Stories inspired by Jane Eyre. In 'A Migrating Bird', a young Turkish woman is drawn to a Dutch student on foreign exchange at her university.

"'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...' Our brains stay active for ten minutes after our heart stops beating. For Tequila Leila, each minute brings with it a new memory - growing up with her father and his two wives...

"En un convulso 1974, mientras el ejército turco ocupa el norte de Chipre, Kostas, un griego cristiano, y Defne, una turca musulmana, se reúnen en secreto bajo las vigas ennegrecidas de la taberna La Higuera Feliz, donde cuelgan ristras de ajos, cebollas y pimientos. Allí, lejos del fragor de la guerra, crece a través de una cavidad en el techo una higuera, testigo del amor de los dos jóvenes, pero también de sus desencuentros, de la destrucción...

'My mother died twice. I promised myself I would not let her story be forgotten'. And so begins the story of Esma a young Kurdish woman in London trying to come to terms with the terrible murder her brother has committed. Esma tells the story of her family stretching back three generations; back to her grandmother and the births of her mother and Aunt in a village on the edge of the Euphrates. Named Pembe and Jamila, meaning Pink and Beautiful rather...

"XVI century. Ottoman Empire. The era of Suleiman the Magnificent. By the will of fate, twelve-year-old Jahan and his ward, a white elephant named Chota, find themselves in Istanbul, at the court of a powerful sultan. Here Jahan is destined to experience many amazing adventures, find friends, meet love and become a student of the outstanding architect - the architect Sinan. An amazing story about the freedom of creativity, about the battle between...