Tulip of Istanbul (P.B)

Tulip of Istanbul is a historical novel that depicts the Ottoman Empire’s glorious times in art and aesthetics, as well as the elegance and grandeur of dreams. At the same time, it was an era of excess and waste, marked by economic and social collapse. Known as the Tulip Age, this period saw, in 1730, a great public revolt which changed the course of Turkey’s destiny. The novel begins with the story of a young man who finds his beautiful wife murdered on the wedding night. What is more perverse, the innocent young man himself is charged with the murder of his wife and thrown into prison. To prove his innocence and to find the murderer of his lover, his only clue is a tulip bulb that he saw in the palm of his dead wife. He has a secret identity that he was initially unaware of; he is a prince, the son of a sultan, who has grown up outside the palace. An intrigue develops in the power circle about his rumoured existence. The story is interweaved with historical and cultural detail, introducing the reader to life within royal palaces and dervish lodges, to horticultural secrets about growing exclusive tulips, innovative treatment for the insanes in the asylum, torture devices in the prison, and to the conspiracies hatched in coffee houses and hamams by disaffected revolutionaries and gangsters. Iskender Pala creates a bewitching tapestry of the splendours and vices of Istanbul at a time when the world was still in thrall to its military, political, and artistic achievements.