The Book Club discussion

Use this thread as a place to post background information that will be useful to your colleagues as they read Istanbul Passage.

If you know a review contains spoilers, warn the rest of us when you post it.

"Joseph Kanon is an American author, best known for thriller and spy novels set in the period immediately after World War II." Google summary.

"Joseph Kanon is the author of five novels, Los Alamos, which won the Edgar Award for best first novel; The Good German, which was made into a film starring George Clooney and Cate Blanchett; The Prodigal Spy and Alibi, which earned Kanon the Hammett Award of the International Association of Crime Writers; and Istanbul Passage, ...released in May, 2012.

"He is also a recipient of The Anne Frank Human Writers Award for his writings on the aftermath of the Holocaust. Before becoming a full-time writer, he was a book publishing executive. He lives in New York City with his wife, literary agent Robin Straus. They have two sons."

From his web site. For Goodreads links to his books, see next post. (Those should get you to reviews, et al.)

Nothing in these first posts you can't get readily by googling his name, but thought I'd call a few of these with a clip or two to our attention.

http://josephkanon.com/ -- the author's web site.

This video narrated by the author about the book and its settings is a pleasant visual introduction:

http://videos.simonandschuster.com/vi...

This link on Simon & Schuster seems to be identical to the one at the top of Kanon's web site -- so no need to bother with both, but do highly recommend watching one or the other.

Kanon's short essay on Istanbul food is fun, e.g., "street food is one of Istanbul’s joys: doner kebaps, stuffed mussels, towers of simits (sesame bread rings)."

Joseph Kanon's novels:


Los Alamos (1997)

The Prodigal Spy (1998)

The Good German (2001)

Alibi: A Novel (2005)

Stardust: A Novel (2009) -- not mentioned in quotation above.

Istanbul Passage (2012)

Publication dates from Wikipedia

Enjoyed seeing the places he talks about in the book. The characters have pulled me into the book. I'm intrigued.

Janet wrote: "Enjoyed seeing the places he talks about in the book. The characters have pulled me into the book. I'm intrigued."

Good afternoon, J. Thanks for posting. I believe this is one of the books that came to us from your suggestion. I haven't downloaded it yet, so don't know the specific locations to tie to the story. I hesitate to add more pictures until I do. You do know D. was in Istanbul earlier this year -- another factor in our choosing this book?

PS -- thx for your blog. Haven't checked it in awhile, but really fun to see.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/wo...

Not this (Istanbul Passage) story, but murder in Istanbul made U.S. news today (3/17/13).

Here is the best overall picture gallery for Istanbul that I have seen so far. I will point to specific sections associated with passages from our book, but in case I don't get to that any time soon, here is a good overall source for pictorially touring the region.

http://english.istanbul.com/photogallery -- photos

This site provides an overview of the geography of the region:

http://english.istanbul.com/about-ist...

"At the south of Istanbul the Marmara Sea, and at the north the Black Sea are situated. The Western part of the city is in Europe, and the Eastern is in Asia. The important watercourse that divides Istanbul is the Bosphorus. As a seaport both the closest Asian city to Europe and the closest European city to Asia, and the passage of all commerce ways from here, increases the importance of Istanbul."

From the geography site above.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=...

Called "Top 10 Things to Do in Istanbul," you would find that many will relate to our book. Most surprising will be #1 -- in a spooky way.

3 3/4 min. in length.