I told my family that I wanted any book by Elif Shafak for Christmas and this arrived from a special Santa Claus. It was not the book I expected, but I really enjoy Shafak's writing so I was delighted with it.
I finally got around to reading it (via audiobook) this month. I dove in without any real preparation or thought about this beyond knowing that it would be somehow a story of an architect and an apprentice. In hindsight, I wish I had done a tiny little bit more investigation prior to reading.
This is essentially historical fiction- Ottoman Empire style. It feels fanciful- if one is not familiar with the Ottoman Empire. I am not familiar with the Ottoman Empire so I really for some time thought that maybe this was just sort of a made up Ottoman Empire. This showed mostly my lack of education in world history. Yikes!
Spoiler? - It is not. The majority of the characters in the book are indeed actual historical figures from this time period. I suspect had I known that, I might have enjoyed the book quite a bit more.
Jahan is a 12 yr old boy who arrives in Istanbul on a ship in 1540- he's befriended an elephant who was intended for the Sultan, and becomes the Mahout- the Elephant keeper. Chota, the elephant is smart and affords Jahan many opportunities, including the opportunity to get to know the daughter of the Sultan. Chota is beloved by Jahan, and the entire empire it seems. (As a side note, there was apparently quite a menagerie in Istanbul back in the day- something that would no longer be looked on favorably, but I was somewhat impressed that they were able to have lions, birds, apes, etc and that they sort of survived in that time period.
Through the eyes of Jahan, the reader is able to experience life in the Empire, within the walls of the palace and beyond. Jahan eventually becomes an apprentice to the architect - Mirmar Sinan and he's about to again see the process of building some of the fantastic famous structures that we know today. We experience wars, travel, unrequited love, a cross dressing apprentice, magic, deceit, palace intrigue and deception. Jahan, being pure of heart and a little naive no matter how old he gets, is an interesting lens to view the happenings through. He is - it seems- always about 3 steps behind, and is often the victim of treachery, but somehow still bumbles on through momentous events and change- mostly by clinging to the elephant. I kept expecting Jahan to have more of a hero's journey type experience, but now that I've finished the novel, this really wasn't a hero type novel, and while Jahan is the central character, he has no "Main character Energy" and he's more our eyeballs as we observe the Empire change and grow. With a different expectation, I likely would have enjoyed this a tiny bit more. I honestly kept waiting for "something" to happen. In truth, so much happened, but it was not packaged into that neat Hero's journey arc that we are very familiar with, so it felt more like a river flowing steadily through time than a tale with certain well known punctuations.
Shafak's writing is - as always- immensely readable, and engaging. She always punctuates her stories with very thoughtful observations that are quite quotable. This book would be an excellent choice for a slow reading book club, where a guide would take the reader chapter by chapter through the fiction and the facts because the overlap is wonderful and for many of us, I suspect, not well known. It certainly made me want to explore Istanbul!
While I enjoyed the Island of Missing Trees more overall, I think The Architect's Apprentice is also a worthwhile read. I am also super pleased to have it on the shelf of "read" books in my home now! I can not wait to read more from Shafak, and I love that there's a nice Back list to choose from.
STATS
First Published : January 2013
Pages: 432
Available as an Audio Book : YES
Trigger Warnings: child abuse, pandemic, animal mistreatment, death
As always - this is not a complete list, read responsibly!
I'm about to start There are Rivers in the Sky. I've read a few other of her books, but not the architect one. I like that her books aren't always about exactly the same thing. Glad to see you liked this one.
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