The Candy Palace

Description

A building gifted by an aristocratic Russian immigrant to his beloved.
The building depicts the contradictions and tensions of Istanbul society, including immigrants, minorities, the marginalized, and the crazy: a university professor; twins running a barbershop; a pious man with his daughter-in-law and grandchildren; a cleanliness-obsessed woman and her louse-ridden daughter; and the blue lover.

But above all, The Candy Palace is a novel about social injustice, the fear of losing one’s identity, the dominance of fate over the characters’ destinies, and the game of love that dooms confused souls to death.

Elif Shafak is the best novelist in Turkey this decade.
(Orhan Pamuk)