A very well-written account of the author's family in Istanbul during the early years of 1900. Read in preparation for our trip to Turkey. ( )

A tremendously beautiful and sad memoir; the author recalls his privileged Istanbul upbringing in the early 20th century. Servants, luxury, loving parents, holidays on a family estate, and visits to the Turkish Baths...all set amid beside the glittering Bosphorous.
Suddenly this was all ripped away with the onslaught of WW1....the men sent off to die, the women selling off their treasures and moving into lowly accommodation. As the family begin to starve, and his cosseted mother has to find factory work, the children are sent off to a charity school...
And things can never really be repaired thereafter....the boys forever feeling cast off; the mother suffering mental health problems from her privations. While the author made it through military school and flew for the Turkish Air Force, his later like in UK was beset by difficulties
Lovely writing. ( )

CX 21

A very gripping novel about the tragic family history of a young boy, later a young man, in Istanbul and other places of Turkey. All classic themes come by, father - son, mother - son, brothers, grandparents, all grief big and small. And then the first World War starts and all changes. And again a can of themes is opened: wealth, poverty, togetherness, religion, anxiety, ....
Near the end the story gets lengthy when the author tells about his own affairs in the military, while for me the depictions of the family, and especially the authors mother, are the best parts. The authors mother is a young beautiful wife at the start of the story and she gets confronted with the worst scenario in war. The relentless search for a new attitude, one would even say a new identity, after this tragic event is without doubt very courageous.
Masculin viewpoints by the author, with his cultural background, do prevent him from being completely aware, so it seems, of this journey his mother has to go. Only in the end comes pure sympathy but then it's too late.
Could have been written a bit more dense, a bit less selfcomplaining, and then it would have had more than the current 3,5 stars. Still very well worth your time. ( )

Het is een autobiografie in de vorm van een ontwikkelingsroman. En ja, het geeft een beeld van het Turkije van begin twintigste eeuw waarin de religieuze orthodoxie en de familie bepalen wat mag en niet kan. Met nadruk natuurlijk op het laatste. In het verhaal worden de aanloop en gevolgen van de eerste wereldoorlog op een aannemelijk wijze beschreven. Maar dat is het dan wel. De schrijver doet zijn best om de in het boek voorkomende familieleden een plaats te geven, maar laat de karakters uiteindelijk toch wat bungelen.
Zijn moeder bij voorbeeld, die in alle ellende toch overeind blijft, blijkt een vastberaden en moderne vrouw te zijn en verdient daardoor eigenlijk het middelpunt van de roman te zijn.

Misschien zou je het zo kunnen formuleren: de schrijver besloot zijn biografie te publiceren maar had beter die van zijn moeder kunnen schrijven. Nu verwatert het verhaal om gaandeweg oninteressant te worden. ( )