There are Rivers in the Sky

The breathtaking new novel from the Booker-shortlisted, bestselling author of The Island of Missing Trees and 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World.


This is the story of one lost poem, two great rivers, and three remarkable lives – all connected by a single drop of water.

In the ruins of Nineveh, that ancient city of Mesopotamia, there lies hidden in the sand fragments of a long-forgotten poem, the Epic of Gilgamesh.

In Victorian London, an extraordinary child is born at the edge of the dirt-black Thames. Arthur’s only chance of escaping poverty is his brilliant memory. When his gift earns him a spot as an apprentice at a printing press, Arthur’s world opens up far beyond the slums, with one book soon sending him across the seas: Nineveh and Its Remains.

In 2014 Turkey, Narin, a Yazidi girl living by the River Tigris, waits to be baptised with water brought from the holy sit of Lalish in Iraq. The ceremony is cruelly interrupted, and soon Narin and her grandmother must journey across war-torn lands in the hope of reaching the sacred valley of their people.

In 2018 London, broken-hearted Zaleekhah, a hydrologist, moves to a houseboat on the Thames to escape the wreckage of her marriage. Zaleekhah foresees a life drained of all love and meaning – until an unexpected connection to her homeland changes everything.

A dazzling feat of storytelling from one of the greatest writers of our time, Elif Shafak’s There are Rivers in the Sky is a rich, sweeping novel that spans centuries, continents and cultures, entwined by rivers, rains, and waterdrops:

‘Water remembers. It is humans who forget.’

Review

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

Gloriously expansive and intellectually rich... a magnificent achievement ― The Spectator

Richly evocative. A fascinating stream of storytelling. ― Financial Times

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. ― I Paper

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

About the Author

Elif Shafak is an award-winning British Turkish novelist whose work has been translated into fifty-five languages. The author of nineteen books, twelve of which are novels, she is a bestselling author in many countries around the world. Shafak's latest novel, The Island of Missing Trees, was a top ten Sunday Times bestseller, a Reese Witherspoon Book Club pick and was shortlisted for the Costa Novel Award and the Women's Prize. Her previous novel 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and the RSL Ondaatje Prize; longlisted for the Dublin Literary Award; and chosen as Blackwell's Book of the Year. She is a Vice-President of the Royal Society of Literature. Shafak was awarded the Halldór Laxness International Literature Prize for her contribution to 'the renewal of the art of storytelling.'