A review by thecolourblue
The Island of Missing Trees by Elif Shafak

challenging dark emotional hopeful reflective sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

“Cartography is another name for stories told by winners. For stories told by those who have lost, there isn’t one.” 

The "island" in The Island of Missing Trees is Cyprus, and the "tree" is a fig tree, the presence of which spans across the story - observing and narrating many of the events. The tree, and the ecology and history of the island itself, as characters are vivid as any of the humans in the book - the main narrative is intercut with historical accounts of politics, ecology, lepidoterology (Cyprus is a stopping point for butterfly migration!) as well as myth and folklore. And food. Of course, food.

The core story happens between the 1970s and 2010s, following initially the young lovers Kostas and Defne, and later their teenage daughter Ada (a name which itself means "island" in Turkish). Kostas is a Greek Cypriot, Defne is a Turkish Cypriot. They have known each other - and loved each other - since childhood. However, the 70s brings a escalating violence between Cyprus' Turkish and Greek communities, separating the couple.

They do not reunite for nearly 16 years, at which point Kostas is an ecologist relocated to London. Despite all odds, they re-kindle their relationship and Defne leaves Cyprus with Kostas - essentially losing all contact with her family (who will not forgive him for her choice in partner) in the process. 

“That is what migrations and relocations do to us: when you leave your home for unknown shores, you don’t simply carry on as before; a part of you dies inside so that another part can start all over again.” 

Kostas and Defne, trying and failing to leave the past behind, opt not to tell their daughter much of there past, leaving her desperately searching for answers - especially after her mother passes away and her long-estranged aunt Meryam arrives to visit from Cyprus. 

Throughout this all, the fig tree that Defne and Kostas played and loved under as children has followed them - in the form of a cutting that Kostas smuggled to London and has lovingly tended ever since. 

It's a really beautiful, heart-breaking novel which sometimes feels more allegorical than real. There's a sense of the magical and wondrous in the story of the star-crossed lovers and the tree, despite the brutality and senseless cruelty of the true events they are situated in.

“I wish I could have told him that loneliness is a human invention. Trees are never lonely. Humans think they know with certainty where there being ends and someone else's starts. With there roots tangled and caught up underground, linked to fungi and bacteria, trees harbour no such illusions. For us, everything is interconnected.”