Midnight Express tells the gut-wrenching true story of a young man's incarceration and escape from a Turkish prison. A classic story of survival and human endurance, told with humor, honesty, and heart, it became a worldwide best-seller and the Academy Award-winning blockbuster film of the same name. In 1970 Billy Hayes was an English major who left college in search of adventures to write about, like his hero Jack London. He had a rude awakening...

From the Nobel Prize winner and best-selling author of Snow and My Name Is Red: a soaring, panoramic new novel—his first since The Museum of Innocence—telling the unforgettable tale of an Istanbul street vendor and the love of his life. Since his boyhood in a poor village in Central Anatolia, Mevlut Karatas has fantasized about what his life would become. Not getting as far in school as he’d hoped, at the age of twelve he comes to Istanbul—“the...

When a brutal murder shocks Istanbul's rundown Jewish quarter, the Turkish police force unleashes their best weapon, the chain-smoking, brandy-swilling Inspector Cetin Ikmen, husband to a strict Muslim woman (who disapproves of his drinking) and loving father of eight (with another on the way). With a colorful, multi-layered setting and a delicious labyrinthine plot, Barbara Nadel's Belshazzar's Daughter is a stunning and evocative crime debut, and...

When a French archaeologist arrives in 1830s Istanbul determined to track down a lost Byzantine treasure, the local Greek communities are uncertain how to react; the man seems dangerously well informed. Yashim Togalu, who so brilliantly solved the mysterious murders in The Janissary Tree, is once again enlisted to investigate. But when the archaeologist's mutilated body is discovered outside the French embassy, it turns out there is only one suspect:...

When Stella Crown hires a new farmhand to help run her Pennsylvania dairy business, she gets more than she bargained for. Her new helper is a Mennonite widow who arrives burdened not only with grief, but with rumors of infidelity and murder...and a young child. Before you know it, Stella, battling her own deep sorrow over the loss of her long-time friend and employee Hank as well as worries over her shaky finances, copes with an influx of nasty in-laws,...

The Janissary Tree, the first book in a new series, is set in a most extraordinary world and features a most extraordinary sleuth.It is 1836. Europe is modernizing, and the Ottoman Empire must follow suit. But just before the sultan announces sweeping changes, a wave of murders threatens the fragile balance of power in his court. Who is behind them? Only one intelligence agent can be trusted to find out: Yashim Togalu, a man both brilliant and near-invisible...

"Traveler Estelle Bingham starts her exploration of the ancient city at Topkapi Palace, former home of sultans and their concubines. She interrupts her sightseeing for a day trip to Gallipoli, the site of an infamous World War I battlefield. Continuing her journey around Istanbul, she visits the opulent Pera Palace Hotel. After some retail therapy in the Grand Bazaar, she ends her journey at the famous Blue Mosque"--Container.

Hundreds of thousands of cats roam the metropolis of Istanbul freely. For thousands of years they've wandered in and out of people's lives, becoming an essential part of the communities that make the city so rich. Claiming no owners, these animals live between two worlds, neither wild nor tame, and they bring joy and purpose to those people they choose to adopt. In Istanbul, cats are the mirrors to the people, allowing them to reflect on their lives...

When computer programmer Hope Cassidy arrives in Istanbul to begin her new job, her life is thrown into chaos. Her credit cards no longer work, all of the money is gone from her bank account, and her identity is stolen. Now Hope has to use all her skills in order to steal back her name and unravel the mystery. Thanks to some help from a cab driver and flight attendant, she will be able to uncover the truth about what is happening to her. Can she take...

Recounts the author's experiences fleeing Iran as a young boy during the Iran-Iraq war, and making his way on his own in the unfamiliar city of Istanbul in hopes of attaining a visa in England.