I am aware that I will be in the minority, and I wish this book and its readers a great journey, but I did not like my journey with this book as much as I wanted to.

If Narin’s story were told in a separate book, I would have fancied my reading journey more. I had little interest in Zaleekhah’s story and Arthur’s storyline was a mixed bag.
The settings being Mesopotamia and England was creative, and readers who are new to Mesopotamia and its history will likely like this book more than I do - Shafak makes the information she needs for the context of these stories available and clear. And this was something that affected my reading negatively, due to a personal preference for more nuanced, blended and poetic style.

For similar reasons, despite the water, river, time-space connections, I expected a more smooth, seamless and unpredictable connection between the narrators and timelines.

It is an arduous task to write this book, and I am sure a lot of research and work went into it. It was just not my cup of tea.

In her latest novel, the brilliant Elif Shafak invites us to travel with her through time and place and exceptional lives, showing how the threads of connection span across such barriers effortlessly.

From ancient Mesopotamia and Victorian England to contemporary Britain and Turkey, we are introduced to diverse lives being lived in disparate cultures, where the universal themes of love, loss, and home nevertheless continue to hold sway over the hearts and minds of each of her beautifully-drawn characters.

This new story by one of the greatest voices in global literature is not to be missed. It is well worth your time.

Elif Shafak is an absolute master storyteller and this latest novel was no exception.

There are Rivers in the Sky is set across 3 timelines, Victorian London (Arthur), 2014 (Narin) and 2018 (Zaleekah) and we follow these 3 characters as their lives intersect with one another through water and the long-forgotten poem, the Epic of Gilgamesh. Like most works by Shafak, I really think the less you know going in, the better. Her writing and characterisation really bring every page to life and I fell in love with each of the characters and was completely immersed in their lives and their stories.

Do yourself a favour and pick this one up, you will be hard pressed to put it down once you start!

Absolutely incredible. Not only the writing, the characters, the stories - but the amount of research into every aspect of the history that this is based around is simply astounding. It could have been try and textbooky with the amount of information, but it was a seamless part of the stories.

A huge thank you for the advanced reader's copy - this was one of my most anticipated reads of the year and it did not disappoint. Elif Shafak's work just gets better and better imo.

I absolutely loved this. Three storylines, connected by the Epic of Gilgamesh and one singular raindrop.

Arthur (19th century London) works on deciphering Mesopotamian tablets, and his storyline was so captivating and interesting.
Narin (2014, Turkey) is a Yazidi girl who is going deaf and wants to travel to Iraq for her baptism. I didn't know a lot about the Yazidi people, so I learned a lot. Not always pleasant, but so well done.
Zaleekhah (2018, London) is a recently divorced water scientist and struggles with her rich uncle and aunt who raised her, but aren't always so accepting of her. I felt connected to her as a character, but this storyline moved me the least.

All in all, a really excellent book that I will recommend to everyone.

🐱 Favourite quote:

"And if we could only see the world through a baby's eyes, gazing up with innocent wonder, we could watch the rivers in the sky. Mighty rivers that never cease to flow."

🐈 My thoughts:

I have no words to express how much I loved this book. Elif Shafak is one of those writers that I will automatically buy, I know I will read something beautiful and that is going to stay with me for a long time. This one was exactly that, and I must add - my favourite so far.
The research and work put in to this book is noticed. I learned so much and, as usual with this writer, it brought my attention to current issues that I confess I wasn't aware of. My heart broke several time, I connected deeply with all the characters being Zaleekhah my favourite.
The way all the characters connected within the story, the mystery of water and how they all came together at the end... just amazing. As I say, no words! (The more I love a book the less I can express myself).

This is such a powerful, incredibly written story that I couldn't stop turning the pages and the messages within it will stay with me. Told over various time-points and with different main characters, you can't help but be totally immersed within the story. It's incredible how Shafak has written about such different places, different eras, all in such a fantastic way which makes you believe you are there. Such talent.

There are some brutal scenes which at first I thought were in the past, but it's only as the story progresses that you realise this is the modern-day plot. This is so stunning, it makes you realise that the world still has some horrific things happening, that other humans are inflicting on others... very powerful.

Water ties all of the plots together, weaving them carefully together until the very end.

With incredibly researched areas, brilliantly crafted characters and lots of emotion, this is a book which is fantastic. I will definitely be reading more of Elif Shafak's books.

if there is one thing about elif shafak: she‘s gonna make me cry. i read her books ever since i was a literally child (i used to read her books in turkish) and im still obsessed

Elif Shafak is the master of historical and literary fiction. She's the high priestess of weaving narratives, three distinct stories unified by one thread, coming together at the end. I have read pretty much all of this author's bibliography and I am confident to say that it's her best work so far (even though i'll always be a 40 Rules ol Love girly deep down) I have learnt so so so much about Yazidis and the genocide, about their relationship to the land, to nature, to water. Water was a character in this book, in fact, she was the true main character! One single drop of water connecting every single characters together. Aaaah, I found that I'm just not that articulate when I adore a book. Absolutely EPIC. Good luck waiting until August and ENJOY to all the lucky ones who have a proof.
Deeply thankful to Netgalley for my ARC!

There are Rivers in the Sky tells three stories and two rivers which are connected by one drop of water. The story follows Arthur who is born next to the River Thames in Victorian London. He is trying to escape poverty. The story also follows Narin in Turkey in 2014, she lives by the River Tigris but she and her grandmother have to take out a journey across war torn land. Zaleekah is in London in 2018 and she moves onto a houseboat on the Thames.

This novel is a great undertaking for both the author but also the reader. It wasn’t really for me even though I thought I would like it because I like historical fiction and I like stories that span time and history. The story was just too long for me and I found it quite tiring to read. There was three POV’s to keep up with but the story in itself is heavy and very detailed. It is obvious this author has put a lot of work and research into this novel and it is clear this author has carefully crafted this novel. It just wasn’t my thing but I would recommend this to fans of multiple POV’s, long tales and intricate detail.

On a stunning and epic tale of lives connected by a single drop of water that spans different centuries and countries. Grateful for the opportunity to read this early. I think this book is even better and more complex than Shafak’s previous books. I read a couple of pages last night and pretty much finished the entire book today.⁣
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This book follows three characters in different time periods. You have Arthur who’s born into poverty near River Thames with a gift of extraordinary memory in Victorian London; Narin, a 9-year old Yazidi girl living near River Tigris who’s taken away by ISIS during the 2014 Iraq war; and Zaleekhah, a water scientist in London who’s somewhat lost following a separation from her husband, set in 2018.⁣
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I was very intrigued by the opening chapter that tells the story of King Ashurbanipal of Mesopotamia in ancient Nineveh that sets the scene of how the stories in the book revolve, especially in how the characters are bound by Epic of Gilgamesh, one of the greatest poems of all time. I also think that it’s particularly clever to link the three seemingly unconnected stories via a single drop of water that holds the memories of life. Shafak not interweaves her characters’ stories skilfully, but she also blends her captivating storytelling with historical details, including the history of the Yazidi people that I didn’t know much about as well as the complexity of marginalised lives and displaced people. ⁣
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“…How does a people survive the painful realisation that not only is their history full of oppression, persecution and massacres, but their future may also offer more of the same?”⁣
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There’s so much to reflect on beauty and pain, and I shall be thinking about it for a while.

This was a really profound, well-executed, intelligent and a heart-searing book that I thoroughly enjoyed from start to finish and devoured it in one single sitting.

Another sublime novel from Elif Shafak that is truly monumental in its scope. Reminiscent of Victory City in terms of its core reference to epic poetry, this is a work that covers vast themes and expertly weaves together spellbinding plot strands. I love Shafak's writing style and the sense of setting cultivated was strong and visceral. Every page is rich with detail in this absorbing contemplation on the human condition.

Many thanks to the author, publisher and Netgalley for providing an ARC of this book in exchange for an unbiased review.