A mesmerizing love story with a cast of beguiling characters, from the Nobel prizewinning author Orhan Pamuk Winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature A magnificent novel. Wall Street Journal Powerful and moving. TLS Books of the Year Prepare to fall in love Mail on Sunday As head-exploding as War and Peace, and more comforting Elif Batuman As a child, Mevlut always felt like he was missing out. When he moves to Istanbul - the centre of the world - he is immediately enthralled. He wanders through its alleys for forty years, working as a street vendor and gaining a unique perspective of a radically changing city. Mevlut watches his friends and relatives settle down and make their fortunes, while he stumbles toward middle age in a series of jobs leading nowhere. He never manages to shake the strangeness in his mind , until at last fortune conspires to let him understand what it is he yearns for . . .
