There are Rivers in the Sky by Elif Shafak (Penguin Books)
I'm known in family circles for being someone who swallows books whole - I got through 8 books in an 8 day holiday after all. However hold on to your hats as this book has taken me three weeks to finish.
This wasn't because I was struggling with it, or because I felt I had to finish it but rather because it was so beautiful, complex and reflective that I just had to read it slowly.
The publisher blurb reads:
There Are Rivers in the Sky is a rich, sweeping novel set between the 19th century and modern times, about love and loss, memory and erasure, hurt and healing, centred around three enchanting characters living on the banks of the River Thames and the River Tigris - their lives all curiously touched by the epic of Gilgamesh.
This doesn't give much away about the book and I think that might be the best way to approach it. This is very much a fable woven around real people and situations and the epic of Gilgamesh and the power of story telling is very important throughout.
While at first I wasn't sure about the style or why the story focussed on these three people/timelines it was all drawn together so wonderfully as the story unfolded and I think that this is a genuine masterpiece of a book.
I came across Shafak with her The Island of Missing Trees in 2021 and while this book isn't quite the same easy read as that I think that it is possibly better and I am very glad that I took my time and savoured this one. And with some of the news stories coming from the Middle East as I write this review it is shockingly prescient too.
Many thanks to Penguin and NetGalley for my copy of this book.
