amoflynn 's review for:

10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World by Elif Shafak

4.25

challenging emotional informative reflective sad tense medium-paced

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Shafak’s prose is lyrical but unrelenting, peeling back the layers of societal hypocrisy with clarity and care. In this novel, she uses the intimate story of a murdered sex worker, Tequila Leila, to explore broader themes of gender, marginalization, and authoritarian morality in modern Turkish society. It is structured around a concept that the brain remains active after death. In that window, 10 minutes and 38 seconds, Leila relives her life through sensory memories, offering the reader an intricate tapestry of personal trauma, resilience, and fleeting joy. 

Shafak anchors Leila’s story in actual historical events like the Bloody May Day massacre of 1977 and in real landmarks including Istanbul’s Bhosporus Bridge connecting Europe and Asia and the Cemetery of the Companionless, a grim resting place for society’s outcasts. These real elements are not incidental; they contextualize Leila’s life within a city and a culture wrestling with contradictions: modern yet deeply patriarchal, pluralistic in appearance but rigid in moral judgment. 

The novel is especially incisive in its critique of how conservative, religious structures often serve to obscure, excuse, or even enable violence against women. Leila’s abuse at the hands of her family is met not with justice, but with silence and shame. It is with her eventual flight to Istanbul that Leila finds beauty in friendship. Her five companions, each broken in their own way, become her chosen family, standing in stark contrast to the biological one that erased her. 

This is a story for the silenced, told with compassion and righteous fury. A great read.