If you know your Bosphorus from phosphorus and Gezi Park means something to you, you’ll probably love Elliot Ackerman’s new novel. If the strait that separates the European and Asian parts of Turkey and the 2013 demonstrations against urban development in Istanbul drive you to Google, you might not appreciate the novel as much at first, but don’t be afraid to give it a try.
Let’s start with the characters: First there’s Catherine, an expat married to an influential Turkish real estate developer named Murat. Catherine and Murat have an adopted son, William, whose lineage is one of the book’s slowly revealed mysteries. And Catherine has a lover, Peter, who Ackerman imagines snapping the real-life famous photo referenced in the book’s title during the Gezi Park protests. Finally, there’s Kristin, an employee at the U.S. consulate who does much more than facilitate naturalization paperwork. She’s not quite CIA, but plays the roll of chess master, whose job Ackerman describes as keeping “each side in a state of tension — which is to say, equilibrium — with the other.”
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