A Watermelon, a Fish and a Bible: A heartwarming tale of love amid war

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I wouldn’t actively seek out further books as they don’t really fall into my preferred genres but they are informative, somewhat disturbing and structured with great research, thought and some personal knowledge. Songbirds” by Christy Lefteri introduces a poacher named Yiannis. The man makes a living trapping the very small protected songbirds that make a stopover in Cyprus on the way to Europe from Africa.

Ocr tesseract 4.1.1 Ocr_detected_lang en Ocr_detected_lang_conf 1.0000 Ocr_detected_script Latin Ocr_detected_script_conf 0.9611 Ocr_module_version 0.0.6 Ocr_parameters -l eng Old_pallet IA19863 Openlibrary_editionOur Opinion: A debut novel, by an author who was born in 1980 to Greek Cypriot parents living in exile in London, very powerful and moving – Written so well the reader strikes an empithy with the characters, feeling the anger, sorrow and anguish about what was happening to them. As Afra and Nuri travel across a landscape broken by the war, they have to confront not only their own unspeakable loss and pain but a lot of danger. The best bits of this book are the beginning and the end. It starts off with this really fairy-tale like sequence, full of symbolism. It's beautiful, and sad, setting you up to journey through war-torn Cyprus in 1974. Lefteri moves you through the capture of Kyrenia through several viewpoints: Maroulla's childish innocence, Adem Berker's loss and guilt, Richard's longing, Commander Serkan Demir's anger and hatred, Koki's fear. Sometimes it's too much--the core of this story feels like Koki's, the way she's caught between Greeks and Turks, an outcast to both groups as much as she is deeply tied to both. I loved the way Adem's, Richard's and Koki's stories weaved in and out of each other, I didn't care so much about Serkan or what his whole confusing interaction with the baby was about, and whilst I loved the thread of the rose and the petals and the innocent fairy tale of Maroulla that both starts and ends the novel, she wasn't ultimately very important to the story. Whilst she acted as a sort-of impetus for Koki to keep moving, keep trying to survive, I kind of feel that she could have been replaced by anything (or anyone) else. The middle dragged a little as events played out over the five days. There's an immersion in memories of the past, both a sense of longing for what was as well as a lingering regret over how things played out over the years. Ostracism of the Other seems to be a key theme which recurs over and over again, both on a personal and a national level, with the microaggressions of the Greek-Cypriots against Adem and Koki seemingly representative the aggressions of the Greek-Cypriots towards the Turkish-Cypriots and the British in their midst on a national level. In retaliation, the Turkish soldiers rape the women and murder the men on a macro scale of revenge, even though these specific women have done nothing to them personally.

Again, I feel that the reading of this book was slightly impacted by the fact that I was reading it in spurts, mainly while on various trains, and whilst really sleepy. Still, this goes to show that it wasn't particularly exciting to me, because I've powered through books in the middle of the night whilst dead-tired because I really wanted to know what happens next. At any rate, I liked it enough despite the fact that it's historical fiction and not fantasy, so *shrug*. Thinking it over, I'm not too sure if the 4-star is impacted by bias. Now that I'm writing the review, I'm wavering down to about a 3-star, so I'd say it's a tentative 3.5-star book, just because I'm not sure. It is a beautifully written, moving, compassionate, and powerful story that showcases the triumph of the human spirit. Dear Ms. Lefteri, It is with the deepest respect and admiration that I write to you. The devastating story of The Beekeeper of Aleppo was so much more than a story of deep loss that war and dislocation creates. You have profoundly made the personal, universal. You have nurtured the deepest empathic sensibilities possible in your readers. Nuri and Afra are embedded in my heart, and they color my thoughts about the capacity for human suffering and recovery, as only a majestic author can do. From my heart I thank you for your art and your ability to touch the soul. Your book is regularly discussed by book groups and read in libraries by people who could never imagine being in the situation that Nuri and Afra find themselves. What is the message you would like the reader to take away with them?

There book contains accounts of violent and distressing scenes, including some of the group of women being taken off to be gang raped and returned battered and bleeding. Even so it is beautifully written, and explores whether the main characters can come to terms with their past and present. It makes you want to know more about Cyprus and its history, and to be able to recount what happened to Koki and Maroulla to the sometimes violent past of such a beautiful island and it's people. A Watermelon, a Fish, and a Bible” is set on a sunny and bright morning in 1974 when the Turkish army invaded Kyrenia, a town on the island of Cyprus. The best bits of this book are the beginning and the end. It starts off with this really fairy-tale like sequence, full of symbolism. It's beautiful, and sad, setting you up to journey through war-torn Cyprus in 1974. Lefteri moves you through the capture of Kyrenia through several viewpoints: Maroulla's childish innocence, Adem Berker's loss and guilt, Richard's longing, Commander Serkan Demir's anger and hatred, Koki's fear. Sometimes it's too much--the core of this story feels like Koki's, the way she's caught between Greeks and Turks, an outcast to both groups as much as she is deeply tied to both. I loved the way Adem's, Richard's and Koki's stories weaved in and out of each other, I didn't care so much about Serkan (Lefteri admitted that he was a rather two-dimensional character without an arc) or what his whole confusing interaction with the baby was about, and whilst I loved the thread of the rose and the petals and the innocent fairy tale of Maroulla that both starts and ends the novel, she wasn't ultimately very important to the story. Whilst she acted as a sort-of impetus for Koki to keep moving, keep trying to survive, I kind of feel that she could have been replaced by anything (or anyone) else. For Richard, growing old and grey in a dank bedsit in the centre of London, where the underground trains shake the foundations, the invasion of Cyprus stirs memories of his time as a British pilot, of a woman, a child and a secret it is becoming all too difficult to keep. In 2010, she published her debut work “A Watermelon, a Fish, and a Bible” but it was her second novel that made her name as an author to watch.