The Island of Missing Trees

SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION 2022 THE TOP TEN SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER & REESE WITHERSPOON BOOK CLUB PICK * You don't fall in love in Cyprus in the summer of 1974. Not here, not now. In 1974, two teenagers, from opposite sides of a divided Cyprus, meet at a tavern in the city they both call home. The tavern is the only place that Kostas, who is Greek, and Defne who is Turkish, can meet in secret, hidden beneath the leaves of a fig tree growing through the roof of the tavern. This tree will witness their hushed happy meetings, and will be there when the war breaks out and the teenagers vanish. Decades later in north London, sixteen-year-old Ada has never visited the island where her parents were born. She seeks to untangle years of her family's silence, but the only connection she has to the land of her ancestors Is a fig tree growing tin the garden of their home . . . * 'This book moved me to tears . . . in the best way. Powerful and poignant' Reese Witherspoon 'A brilliant novel -- one that rings with Shafak's characteristic compassion' Robert Macfarlane 'This is an enchanting, compassionate and wise novel and storytelling at its most sublime' Polly Samson

Elif Shafak is an award-winning British Turkish novelist, whose work has been translated into fifty-eight languages. The author of twenty books, thirteen of which are novels, she is a bestselling author in many countries around the world. Shafak's novel 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and the RSL Ondaatje Prize. The Island of Missing Trees was a Sunday Times bestseller, and was shortlisted for the Costa Novel Award and the Women's Prize for Fiction. There are Rivers in the Sky, which won an Edward Stanford Award for Fiction, is her latest novel. Shafak holds a PhD in political science, and is a Fellow and a Vice President of the Royal Society of Literature. She has been awarded the medal of Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres and, in 2024, was awarded the British Academy President's Medal for 'her excellent body of work which demonstrates an incredible intercultural range'.