{"title":"Books by Burhan Sonmez","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"9781590510988","title":"Labyrinth","description":"A blues singer, Boratin, attempts suicide by jumping off the Bosphorus Bridge, but opens his eyes in the hospital. He has lost his memory, and can t recall why he wished to end his life. He remembers only things that are unrelated to himself, but confuses their timing. He knows that the Ottoman Empire fell, and that the last sultan died, but has no idea when. From the confusion of his social and individual memory, he is faced with two questions. Does physical recognition provide a sense of identity? Which is more liberating for a man, or a society: knowing the past, or forgetting it?","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43204918935730,"sku":"9781590510988","price":14.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781590510988.jpg?v=1786023139"},{"product_id":"9781635422771","title":"Stone and Shadow","description":"\u003cb\u003eLonglisted for the Dublin Literary Award\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThis gorgeous, haunting saga tells the story of modern Turkey and its diverse communities through the life of a gravestone maker.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn the city of Mardin, near Turkey’s border with Syria, the orphaned Avdo finds purpose when an old mason takes him on as an apprentice. From Master Josef, he learns the importance of their art, which looks after the dead and bears witness to their lives. Avdo then travels the country and meets a woman he loves wholeheartedly, only to lose her through a tragic crime. Resigned to a lonely existence, he retreats from the world into his cemetery workshop, but even there, life, with all its sorrows, joys, injustices, and gifts, draws him in unexpected directions.\u003cbr\u003e    An intimate, indelible epic, \u003ci\u003eStone and Shadow \u003c\/i\u003emelds fragments not only from twentieth-century Turkish history, but also from the Ottoman Empire, the wider Middle East, and Europe. Together they form a breathtaking picture of a rich, complex society that encompasses Christians, Sunni Muslims, Alawites, Turks, Kurds, and Armenians.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56304597565813,"sku":"9781635422771","price":17.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781635422771_b0e07cdd-41e2-4b76-9ad2-8d6aa2625bb9.jpg?v=1786023148"},{"product_id":"9781859643846","title":"Sins \u0026 Innocents","description":"\u003cbr\u003eBinding: Paperback \/ softback","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56308716700021,"sku":"9781859643846","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781859643846_9dd909b7-bc94-4d73-8036-5c4276be715e.jpg?v=1786029377"},{"product_id":"9781916788725","title":"Lovers of Franz K.","description":"A thriller of love and revenge, and an imaginative literary obituary for Kafka, bringing the Cold War to life, from Paris and Istanbul to West Berlin and Tel Aviv. West Berlin, 1968. As a youth uprising sweeps over Europe in the shadow of the Cold War, two men face each other across an interrogation table. One, Ferdy Kaplan, has shot and killed a student. Kommissar Muller, the other is trying to find out why. As his interrogation progresses, Kaplan's background is revealed piece by piece, including the love story between him and his childhood friend Amalya, their shared passion for Kafka, and the radical youth movement they joined. When it transpires that Kaplan's intended target was not the student but Max Brod, Franz Kafka's close friend and the executor of his literary estate, the interrogation of a murderer slowly transforms into a dialogue between a passionate admirer of Kafka's work, who is attempting to protect the author's final wish to have his manuscripts burned, and a police commissioner who is learning more about literature than he ever thought possible from a prisoner in his custody. In this gripping, thought-provoking tribute to Kafka, Burhan Sonmez vividly recreates a key period of history in the 1960s, when the Berlin Wall divided Europe. More than a typical mystery, Lovers of Franz K. is an exploration of the value of books, and the issues of anti-Semitism, immigration, and violence that recur in Kafka's life and writings.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56309538554229,"sku":"9781916788725","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781916788725_63863a30-a0da-4e5a-9fd9-fbcc26a9a9c1.jpg?v=1786030858"}],"url":"https:\/\/backstory.london\/collections\/author-burhan-sonmez.oembed","provider":"Backstory","version":"1.0","type":"link"}