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Must-read books by women, as chosen by our readers

Books by Elif Shafak on a colourful background.

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Where to start reading Elif Shafak’s books

On Motherhood and Writing

Black Milk

Black Milk is the affecting and beautifully written memoir on motherhood and writing by Turkey's bestselling female writer Elif Shafak, author of Honour, The Gaze and The Bastard of Istanbul which was long-listed for the Orange prize. 
 
Postpartum depression affects millions of new mothers every year, and- like most of its victims- Elif Shafak never expected to be one of them. 
 
But after the birth of her first child in 2006, the internationally bestselling Turkish author remembers how "for the first time my adult life . . . words wouldn't speak to me". 
 
As her despair finally eased, Shafak sought to resuscitate her writing life by chronicling her own experiences. 
 
In her intimate memoir, she reveals how she struggled to overcome her depression and how literature provided the salvation she so desperately needed. 
 
'An intimate, affecting memoir . . . Her passion for literature is contagious, and her struggle with postpartum depression and writer's block reinforces how carefully all of us must tread. Beautifully rendered, Shafak's Black Milk is an epic poem to women everywhere' Colleen Mondor 
 
*** ELIF SHAFAK'S NEW NOVEL, THERE ARE RIVERS IN THE SKY, IS AVAILABLE NOW ***

Black Milk is a book to dip into, to lend around, a book that you feel deserves to be read by all women attempting to draw together so many differing aspirations. . . It's a book to be readily passed on to. . .

An intimate, affecting memoir . . . Her passion for literature is contagious, and her struggle with postpartum depression and writer's block reinforces how carefully all of us must tread.

Elif Shafak is an award-winning British Turkish novelist, whose work has been translated into fifty-eight languages. The author of twenty books, thirteen of which are novels, she is a bestselling author in many countries around the world. Shafak’s novel 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and the RSL Ondaatje Prize. The Island of Missing Trees was a Sunday Times bestseller, and was shortlisted for the Costa Novel Award and the Women’s Prize for Fiction. There are Rivers in the Sky, which won an Edward Stanford Award for Fiction, is her latest novel. 
 
Shafak holds a PhD in political science, and is a Fellow and a Vice President of the Royal Society of Literature. She has been awarded the medal of Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres and, in 2024, was awarded the British Academy President's Medal for ‘her excellent body of work which demonstrates an incredible intercultural range’.

Postnatal depression affects millions of new mothers every year, and – like most of its victims – Elif Shafak never expected to be one of them. But after the birth of her first child in 2006, the internationally bestselling Turkish author remembers how, ‘for the first time in my adult life... words wouldn't speak to me’. 
 
As her despair finally eased, Shafak sought to resuscitate her writing life by chronicling her own experiences. In her beautiful and intimate memoir, she reveals how she struggled to overcome her depression and how literature provided the salvation she so desperately needed.

The Bastard of Istanbul

A gripping and beautiful novel from Elif Shafak, Booker-shortlisted author of The Island of Missing Trees and 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World 
 
One rainy afternoon in Istanbul a woman walks into a doctor's surgery. 'I want an abortion,' she announces. She is nineteen years old, and unmarried. What happens that afternoon will change her life, and the lives of everyone around her. 
 
 Twenty years later, Asya Kazanci lives with her extended family in Istanbul. A mysterious curse causes all the men to die by the age of 41, so it is a house of women, among them her beautiful, rebellious mother, Zeliha, clairvoyant Auntie Banu and bar-brawl widow, Auntie Cevriye. But when Asya’s Armenian-American cousin Armanoush comes to stay, long hidden family secrets connected with Turkey's turbulent past begin to emerge. 
 
'Wonderfully magical, incredible, breathtaking...will have you gasping with disbelief in the last few pages' Sunday Express 
 
'A beautiful book, the finest I have read about Turkey' Irish Times 
 
'Heartbreaking...the beauty of Islam pervades Shafak's book' Vogue 
 
*** ELIF SHAFAK'S NEW NOVEL, THERE ARE RIVERS IN THE SKY, IS AVAILABLE NOW ***

Unquestionably an ambitious book, exuberant and teeming . . . a novel crammed with characters and themes, not unlike Istanbul itself

Wonderfully magical, incredible, breathtaking . . . will have you gasping with disbelief in the last few pages

Heartbreaking . . . the beauty of Islam pervades Shafak's book

A writer whose artistry matches her ambition . . . she has taken on a subject of deep moral consequence

Tremendous exuberance . . . I do like a writer with a purpose

An astonishingly rich and lively story ... handled with an enchantingly light touch

Overflows with a kitchen sink's worth of zany characters ... an entertaining and insightful ensemble novel that posits the universality of family, culture and coincidence

A tender and spirited novel... Steeped in the sights, colours and smells of Turkey's capital, it grapples with the country's dark legacies

With compassion and a deftly humorous touch, Shafak fashions a woman's world that is at once micro and macro, using everyday material - recipes, lullabies, superstitions - to illuminate a broader reality

One rainy afternoon in Istanbul a woman walks into a doctor’s surgery. ‘I want an abortion,’ she announces. She is nineteen years old and unmarried. What happens that day will change her life, and the lives of everyone around her. 
 
Twenty years later, Asya Kazanci lives with her extended family in Istanbul. A mysterious curse causes all the men to die by the age of forty-one, so it is a house of women, among them her beautiful, rebellious mother, Zeliha, clairvoyant Auntie Banu and bar-brawl widow, Auntie Cevriye. But when Asya’s Armenian-American cousin Armanoush comes to stay, long-hidden family secrets connected with Turkey’s turbulent past begin to emerge.

The Forty Rules of Love

The international bestseller from the Booker-shortlisted author of The Island of Missing Trees and 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World 
 
* One of the BBC's '100 Novels that Shaped the World'* 
 
"Every true love and friendship is a story of unexpected transformation. If we are the same person before and after we loved, that means we haven't loved enough..." 
 
Ella Rubinstein has a husband, three teenage children, and a pleasant home. Everything that should make her confident and fulfilled. Yet there is an emptiness at the heart of Ella's life - an emptiness once filled by love. 
 
 So when Ella reads a manuscript about the thirteenth-century Sufi poet Rumi and his mentor Shams of Tabriz, and his forty rules of life and love, she is ready to look at her life anew. Compelled to embrace change, she embarks on a journey to meet the mysterious author. It is a quest infused with Sufi mysticism and verse, taking Ella and us into a faraway world where faith and doubt are heartbreakingly explored. The Forty Rules of Love is a mesmerising tale of discovery, language, truth and, of course, love itself. 
'Enlightening, enthralling. An affecting paean to faith and love' Metro 
 
'Colourfully woven and beguilingly intelligent' Daily Telegraph 
 
'The past and present fit together beautifully in a passionate defence of passion itself' The Times 
 
*** ELIF SHAFAK'S NEW NOVEL, THERE ARE RIVERS IN THE SKY, IS AVAILABLE NOW ***

With its timely, thought-provoking message . . . The Forty Rules of Love deserves to be a global publishing phenomenon

Enlightening, enthralling. An affecting paean to faith and love

Colourfully woven and beguilingly intelligent

The past and present fit together beautifully in a passionate defence of passion itself

Ella Rubinstein has a husband, three teenage children and a pleasant home. Everything that should make her confident and fulfilled. Yet there is an emptiness at the heart of her life – an emptiness once filled by love. 
 
So when Ella reads a manuscript about the thirteenth-century Sufi poet Rumi and his mentor Shams of Tabriz, and his forty rules of life and love, she is ready to look at her life anew. Compelled to embrace change, she embarks on a journey to meet the mysterious author. It is a quest infused with Sufi mysticism and verse, taking Ella and us into a faraway world where faith and doubt are heartbreakingly explored. The Forty Rules of Love is a mesmerizing tale of discovery, language, truth and, of course, love itself.

The Architect's Apprentice

A dazzling and intricate tale from the Booker-shortlisted author of The Island of Missing Trees, and 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World. 
 
'There were six of us: the master, the apprentices and the white elephant. We built everything together...' 
 
Sixteenth-century Istanbul: a stowaway arrives in the city bearing an extraordinary gift for the Sultan. The boy is utterly alone in a foreign land, with no worldly possessions to his name except Chota, a rare white elephant destined for the palace menagerie. 
 
 So begins an epic adventure that will see young Jahan rise from lowly origins to the highest ranks of the Sultan's court. Along the way he will meet deceitful courtiers and false friends, gypsies, animal tamers, and the beautiful, mischievous Princess Mihrimah. He will journey on Chota's back to the furthest corners of the Sultan's kingdom and back again. And one day he will catch the eye of the royal architect, Sinan, a chance encounter destined to change Jahan's fortunes forever. 
 
 The Architect's Apprentice is a magical, sweeping tale of one boy and his elephant caught up in a world of wonder and danger. 
'A gorgeous picture of a city teeming with secrets, intrigue and romance' The Times 
 
'Exuberant, epic and comic, fantastical and realistic . . . like all good stories it conveys deeper meanings about human experience' Financial Times 
 
'Fascinating. A vigorous evocation of the Ottoman Empire at the height of its power' Sunday Times 
 
'Intricate, multi-layered, resplendent, vividly evoked, beautifully written' Observer 
 
*** ELIF SHAFAK'S NEW NOVEL, THERE ARE RIVERS IN THE SKY, IS AVAILABLE NOW ***

'A gorgeous picture of a city teeming with secrets, intrigue and romance'

'Shafak's most ambitious novel yet her best - generous and imaginative'

'Exuberant, epic and comic, fantastical and realistic . . . like all good stories it conveys deeper meanings about human experience'

'Fascinating. A vigorous evocation of the Ottoman Empire at the height of its power'

'Intricate, multi-layered, resplendent, vividly evoked, beautifully written'

Sixteenth-century Istanbul: a stowaway arrives in the city bearing an extraordinary gift for the Sultan. The boy is utterly alone in a foreign land, with no possessions, except Chota, a rare white elephant destined for the palace menagerie. 
 
So begins an epic adventure that will see young Jahan rise from lowly origins to the highest ranks of the Sultan’s court. Along the way, he will meet deceitful courtiers and false friends, gypsies, animal tamers and the beautiful, mischievous Princess Mihrimah. He will journey with Chota to the furthest corners of the kingdom and back again. And one day, he will catch the eye of the royal architect, Sinan, a chance encounter destined to change Jahan’s fortunes for ever. 
 
The Architect’s Apprentice is a magical, sweeping tale of one boy and his elephant, caught up in a world of wonder and danger.

10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World

SHORTLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE 2019 
 
'Expect vibrant, vivid and eye-opening descriptions of Middle Eastern life propelled by a tender storyline, all in Shafak's haunting, beautiful and considered prose' Vanity Fair 
 
'Incredibly sensuous and poetic and evocative' Pandora Sykes 
 
'In the first minute following her death, Tequila Leila's consciousness began to ebb, slowly and steadily, like a tide receding from the shore. Her brain cells, having run out of blood, were now completely deprived of oxygen. But they did not shut down. Not right away...' 
 
 For Leila, each minute after her death brings a sensuous memory: the taste of spiced goat stew, sacrificed by her father to celebrate the long-awaited birth of a son; the sight of bubbling vats of lemon and sugar which women use to wax their legs while men attend mosque; the scent of cardamom coffee that she shares with a handsome student in the brothel where she works. Each memory, too, recalls the friends Leila made at each key moment in her life – friends who are now desperately trying to find her. . . 
 
'Simply magnificent, a truly captivating work of immense power and beauty, on the essence of life and its end' Philippe Sands 
 
'Elif Shafak brings into the written realm what so many others want to leave outside. Spend more than ten minutes and 38 seconds in this world of the estranged. Shafak makes a new home for us in words' Colum McCann 
 
'A rich, sensual novel... This is a novel that gives voice to the invisible, the untouchable, the abused and the damaged, weaving their painful songs into a thing of beauty.' Financial Times 
 
'One of the best writers in the world today' Hanif Kureishi 
 
*** ELIF SHAFAK'S NEW NOVEL, THERE ARE RIVERS IN THE SKY, IS AVAILABLE NOW ***

A truly captivating work of immense power and beauty

Haunting, moving, beautifully written

A rich, sensual novel... This is a novel that gives voice to the invisible, the untouchable, the abused and the damaged, weaving their painful songs into a thing of beauty.

One of the best writers in the world today

Shafak is the most exciting Turkish novelist to reach western readers in years

A vivid carnival of life and death, cruelty and kindness, love, politics and deep humanity. This is only possible in the hands of a consummate storyteller. Elif Shafak's lyrical command of language and narrative is breathtaking. Brilliant!

Elif Shafak brings into the written realm what so many others want to leave outside. Spend more than ten minutes and 38 seconds in this world of the estranged. Shafak makes a new home for us in words

Elif Shafak's extraordinary Ten Minutes, 38 Seconds in this Strange World is a work of brutal beauty and consummate tenderness, a wild shout of life from out of the lower depths of destitution and prostitution, indeed from beyond the grave itself. Every page throbs with unruly vitality, the sense- saturating colours scents and sounds of raw Istanbul, all registered with poetic sharpness. It's a book which for all its ordeals is a profoundly moving, at times lyrical, celebration of humanity's obstinate fight for life against the steepest of odds

A heartbreaking meditation on the ways in which social forces can destroy a life. Elif Shafak can be unsparing, lyrical, political, intimate... Several novels live in this one, and all of them are moving, generous and elegantly written

Deeply moving, imaginative. Shafak writes with immense compassion

Incredibly sensuous and poetic and evocative

Brilliant. Shafak excels at capturing Istanbul's atmosphere, its labyrinthine alleys, the cultural collision of East and West

Beguiling. There is so much beauty in this book

Life-affirming. A vibrant and rich world that conjures up a life that's filled with love and empathy

Touching, reminiscent of The Lovely Bones. Expect vibrant, vivid and eye-opening descriptions of Middle Eastern life propelled by a tender storyline, all in Shafak's haunting, beautiful and considered prose

Richly uplifting... truly beautiful writing. Thoroughly recommended

A terrific book. Poetic, poignant, trenchant

A thoughtful, charming book that offers a connection to other worlds, perspectives and possibilities

For Leila, each minute after her death brings a vivid memory: the taste of spiced goat stew, sacrificed by her father to celebrate the long-awaited birth of a son; the sight of bubbling vats of lemon and sugar which women use to wax their legs while men attend mosque; the scent of cardamom coffee that she shares with a handsome student in the brothel where she works. Each memory, too, recalls the friends Leila made at each key moment in her life – friends who are now desperately trying to find her . . .

There are Rivers in the Sky

The new novel from the Booker-shortlisted, internationally bestselling author of The Island of Missing Trees and 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World 
 
***** 
 
There Are Rivers in the Sky is a rich, sweeping novel set between the 19th century and modern times, about love and loss, memory and erasure, hurt and healing, centred around three enchanting characters living on the banks of the River Thames and the River Tigris – their lives all curiously touched by the epic of Gilgamesh. 
 
***** 
 
WINNER OF THE GORDON BOWKER PRIZE 2025 
WINNER OF THE INAUGURAL GOOD HOUSEKEEPING GOOD BOOKS SPRING COLLECTION 
FINALIST FOR THE ORWELL PRIZE FOR POLITICAL FICTION 
 
‘Elif Shafak is a unique and powerful voice in world literature’ Ian McEwan 
 
'Shafak makes a new home for us in words' Colum McCann 
 
'One of the best writers in the world today' Hanif Kureishi

It will make you think, cry, rage – and hope. It is Elif Shafak at her best

Gloriously expansive and intellectually rich... a magnificent achievement

Richly evocative. A fascinating stream of storytelling.

Engrossing. I turned the pages hungrily, carried by Shafak’s energetic prose and confident that it was heading towards a coherent and rewarding ending. As ever, Shafak did not disappoint.

An absorbing novel. Shafak is a novelist whose interest in mapping the intricately related world and its history goes beyond literary device.

Elif Shafak is a unique and powerful voice in world literature

A writer of important, beautiful, painful, truthful novels

A brilliant, unforgettable novel, which raises big ideas of 'who owns the past' with nuance and complexity. Elif Shafak ties together diverse time periods and places in a way that seems both natural and wonderfully unexpected.

Make place for Elif Shafak on your bookshelf. Make place for her in your heart too. You won't regret it

It will surprise no one that this is a brutal, elegant and incredible book. Amazing what Elif Shafak has done here - again! Magic.

An odyssey, an epic, a lament, and a tale of redemption, There are Rivers in the Sky is a clarion call to honor the elemental forces that shape our memories, our histories, and our world. In short, a masterpiece.

A book that is astonishing, ingenious and beautiful. A modern classic. Elif Shafak is one of the great writers of our time

A deep and satisfying sweep of a story combining intellectual pleasures with a transformative empathy. Particular, universal, with head and with heart in perfect balance, this is surely a landmark novel.

A great, sweeping, enthralling novel - Elif Shafak's narrative vision is as remarkable and astonishing as ever. Wonderful.

Literature on a grand scale, mythic and timeless

There are Rivers in the Sky is an enchanting epic, told through the vantage of single raindrop, where the sacred mysteries of water, science, and poetry collide. In this gorgeous and riverine novel, water is poetry, water is memory. This is a love song to the keepers of our stories and histories, a resounding tribute to the wise women who know the poetry of our rivers. Elif Shafak is one of them—a master storyteller whose prose thrums with such gorgeous details and propulsive spirit, flowing with a keen-eyed wisdom that only she could conjure. I came away feeling restored

Elif Shafak approaches the world with grace, lyricism, and courage. Confronting societies riven by conflicts over gender, religion, sexuality, nationalism, memory, ideology, and more, Shafak wields the novel’s artistic power to cut through complacency and orthodoxy with ruthlessness and beauty. Her words and works—compelling and provocative—leave us in a space of light, a clearing from where we can see this world anew.

If you were going on aesthetics lone, the latest novel from Shafak (above) would make a gorgeous gift purely for its mesmerising blue and gold cover. But its contents are even more dazzling. Sweeping between multiple settings and timelines, from Victorian London to modern-day Turkey, it is a story about the lives of three very different characters who are interconnected by a lost poem and a single drop of water

From its bravura opening through to its final pages, There are Rivers in the Sky is a dazzling achievement. Shafak’s imagination is a wonder: bold, capacious, beautiful and wise.

Elif Shafak's beautiful and moving new novel bears the reader along on its marvellous currents. Here, rivers twine with other rivers and lives with other lives across centuries and cultures, as the fate of a single drop of water weaves an intricate tapestry of love and loss

...dazzling. Sweeping between multiple settings and timelines, from Victorian London to modern-day Turkey, it's a story about the lives of three very different characters who are interconnected by a lost poem and a single drop of water

iPaper - The 30 best books for Christmas 2024

A meditation on family history, memory and sexual awakening

Anger bubbles over into passion - and then a brilliantly executed twist elevates this love story into something much darker. I've been raving about this all year

Intricate, exhilarating storytelling that is a poetic reminder of how connected we are to one another and to the past.

A great epic novel, as swift as a torrent, as deep as an ocean. Elif Shafak at the height of her powers, sweeping us off our feet.

One of the best writers in the world today

Wide-ranging, eloquent and lavishly detailed, There are Rivers in the Sky expertly draws its various narratives to a powerful climax

There's an elegance to Shafak's storytelling that always draws me, but it is her grit and substance that held me to the last page. Wonderful.

A single raindrop links three narrative threads: Victorian London, where Arthur is obsessed with a lost poem after a visit to the British Museum; the River Tigris in 2014 as Narin flees war with her grandmother; and London in 2018 through the eyes of hydrologist Zaleekhah

One lost poem, two great rivers, three vivid characters from different cultures and times are all united in the ever-changing fate of a single raindrop as it journeys from Victorian London to modern day Turkey in this evocative, immersive epic

If you are a big fan of books that tie together narratives across time, Elif Shafak has written a great one

...in my own stocking I'd love to find Elif Shafak's There Are Rivers in the Sky... it looks like a glorious feast of a novel, from one of the world's most exhilarating storytellers

My novel of the year is Elif Shafak's There Are Rivers in the Sky, a surprising tale of how water connects us all, with a clever cameo role for the British Museum in the 19th century

Daily Express - Closing a chapter on 2024

...Weaving together these three stories with effortless grace, Elif Shafak reminds us she is one of our most evocative storytellers working today. There's an elegance and lyricism to her writing that makes every sentence feel like a work of art. The book is also as intellectually stimulating as it is page-turning; sometimes desperately sad, but often mesmerisingly beautiful

This monumental opus follows a single drop of water as it creates a backdrop not just for otherwise unconnected lives but for a lost epic poem

The Big Issue - Big Issue's top picks of the year

In Victorian London, an extraordinary child is born at the edge of the dirt-black Thames. When his brilliant memory earns him a spot as an apprentice at a printing press, the world opens up far beyond the slums and across the seas.In 2014 in Turkey, Narin, a Yazidi girl living by the River Tigris, waits to be baptized. The ceremony is cruelly interrupted, and soon she and her grandmother must journey across war-torn lands in the hope of reaching the sacred valley of their people.In 2018 in London, broken-hearted Zaleekhah, a hydrologist, moves to a houseboat on the Thames to escape the wreckage of her marriage – until an unexpected connection to her homeland changes everything.A dazzling feat of storytelling from one of the greatest writers of our time, one that spans centuries and continents, this is the story of one lost poem, two great rivers and three remarkable lives – all connected by a single drop of water.

Elif Shafak

Plays with ideas of beauty and ugliness like they're Rubik's cubes

Elif Shafak is the best author to come out of Turkey in the last decade

A gorgeous novel: worldly, intriguing, raucous yet elegant, teeming with love and cruelty - and brilliantly alive

Shafak's novel is a carefully crafted work of imagination... [it] will confirm Shafak's reputation as a writer of impressive range, who is not afraid to ask the big questions

Shafak paints a gorgeous picture of a city teeming with secrets, intrigue and romance. Lush

Vividly evoked, beautifully written... this edifying novel shows how hate and envy destroy, and how love might build the world anew

Shafak blends historical fiction, urban politics and youthful curiosity in an elaborate map of Turkey whose key is the book itself

An obese woman and her lover, a dwarf, are sick of being stared at wherever they go, and so decide to reverse roles. The man goes out wearing make-up and the woman draws a moustache on her face. But while the woman wants to hide away from the world, the man meets the stares from passers-by head on, compiling his 'Dictionary of Gazes' to explore the boundaries between appearance and reality. 
 
Intertwined with the story of a bizarre freak-show organized in Istanbul in the 1880s, The Gaze is a humorous and carnivalesque exploration of what it means to look and be looked at...

Elif Shafak

Praise for The Gaze

Beautifully evoked

Original and compelling

Plays with ideas of beauty and ugliness like they're Rubik's cubes

Beautifully evoked

Original and compelling

Plays with ideas of beauty and ugliness like they're Rubik's cubes

Beautifully evoked

Original and compelling

Plays with ideas of beauty and ugliness like they're Rubik's cubes

Books by Elif Shafak

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Articles featuring Elif Shafak

12 books that make great gifts for Eid

10 books about Muslim experiences to read this Ramadan

Must-read books by women, as chosen by our readers

Where to start reading Elif Shafak’s books

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