There Are Rivers in the Sky

Water carries the story in Elif Shafak's novel, linking lives along the Tigris and the Thames across more than a century. There Are Rivers in the Sky braids several narratives together, moving between Victorian London and the Middle East, and between characters separated by time but joined by rivers, ancient poetry and inherited memory. Shafak's long interest in displacement, minority histories and the survival of stories runs through the book, and the structure lets small objects and single drops of water recur as connective threads. Penguin Publications issues it under the Viking imprint. The short version: • Interwoven narratives spanning Victorian London and Mesopotamia • Rivers used as a structural link between distant lives • Themes of exile, heritage and the endurance of stories • By the novelist behind The Island of Missing Trees Recommended for book clubs and readers of ambitious literary fiction, available at Boipoka.