I Am My Country - by Kenan Orhan (Hardcover)

About the Book

"Spanning decades and landscapes, from forests along the Black Sea to villages along the Euphrates, from the streets of Istanbul to the mountains bordering Iraq, the stories in this collection probe the lives of ordinary people who confront extraordinary moments of personal reckoning. A determined florist trains a neighborhood stray dog to blow up a corrupt president. A garbagewoman finds discarded instruments--and later, musicians--in the trash and takes them home to form a clandestine orchestra in her attic. A smuggler risks his life to traffic a girl claiming to be pregnant via immaculate conception across the border with Iraq. A baker and her husband approach a breaking point in their marriage when an apocalyptic flood threatens their village. A poor cage-maker learns he can talk to birds, and tries to use this gift to enchant his childhood love in the days leading up to the 1955 Istanbul pogrom"--

Book Synopsis

"A powerful and provocative debut collection" (The New York Times Book Review) by "a startling talent who can seemingly do anything" (Anthony Marra) that explores the lives of ordinary people in Turkey to reveal how even individual acts of resistance have extraordinary repercussions.

"I Am My Country employs many different literary styles and voices to dazzling effect."--The Atlantic

FINALIST FOR THE PEN/ROBERT W. BINGHAM PRIZE - LONGLISTED FOR THE STORY PRIZE - AN ELECTRIC LIT AND LIBRARY JOURNAL BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR

Spanning decades and landscapes, from the forests along the Black Sea to the streets of Istanbul, Kenan Orhan's ​playful stories ​conjure dreamlike worlds--of talking animals, flying houses, and omniscient prayer-callers--to ​examine humanity's unfaltering pursuit of hope in even the darkest circumstances.

A determined florist trains a neighborhood stray dog to blow up a corrupt president. A garbage collector finds banned instruments--and later, musicians--in the trash and takes them home to form a clandestine orchestra in her attic. A smuggler risks his life to bring a young woman claiming to be pregnant via immaculate conception across the border with Syria. A poor cage-maker tries to use his ability to talk to birds to woo his childhood love just before the 1955 Istanbul pogrom. These characters are united by a desperate yearning to break free from the volatile realities they face: rising authoritarianism, cultural and political turmoil, and staggering violence.

Ranging from the absurd to the tenderhearted, the stories in I Am My Country illuminate the constant force amid one country's history of rampant oppression and revolutionary progress: the impulse to survive.

Review Quotes

"[This unique and dazzling collection is] one large, literary revolution . . . Orhan's fiction infuses melody, charm, and wonder effortlessly while excavating the real repercussions of an authoritarian regime . . . [It] almost reads like a Gabriel García Márquez novel, complete with magical realism and a timeless decade-spanning, gut-wrenching romance."--Electric Lit

"Smart, heartfelt . . . a powerful and provocative debut collection with a vivid sense of place . . . This is Orhan at his best: finding comedy lurking on the outskirts of tragedy, reveling in the inherent absurdism of the all-too-real."--Justin Taylor, The New York Times Book Review

"Orhan's debut is knitted together by Turkish people struggling to understand the places from which they remain estranged. Magical thinking defines their lives: These characters live under extreme conditions and resort to imagination to break free . . . They reminded me of the characters in James Joyce's debut, Dubliners."--The Nation

"Orhan's talents are immense, and the full glory of his storytelling is on display."--Andrew Sean Greer, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Less Is Lost

"A collection like I Am My Country is a cause for rejoicing. Orhan has a knife-sharp sense of the human impulse for freedom and hope, even amid moments of oppression and displacement."--Kelly Link, author of Get in Trouble

"Moving between the real and the fantastic, the comic and the tragic, these magnificent tales create a complex portrait of Turkey's past, present, and future."--Anthony Marra, author of Mercury Pictures Presents

"A remarkable literary debut . . . These stories have the force of truth and the lasting power of fable."--Saïd Sayrafiezadeh, author of American Estrangement

"Wise, surreal, and sublimely wrought . . . You will leave each story feeling subtly rearranged and longing to return."--Violet Kupersmith, author of Build Your House Around My Body

"A superb collection that overflows with lustrous prose and unflinching insight into the ways in which the human heart and mind push back against oppression."--Anjali Sachdeva, author of All the Names They Used for God

"These characters' fight to maintain normalcy in the face of uncertainty feels poignantly timely. Small, human-scale acts of bravery color Orhan's world, while the consequences of apathy haunt it."--Maria Reva, author of Good Citizens Need Not Fear

"Imaginative, inquisitive, and empathetic, offering a view of recent Turkish history through the vantage point of individual yearning."--Ayşegül Savaş, author of White on White

"Brimming with wisdom and singular lyricism . . . These characters will steal your heart."--Mina Seçkin, author of The Four Humors

"Brilliant, vividly imagined, and incredibly inventive . . . a true delight to read."--Omer Friedlander, author of The Man Who Sold Air in the Holy Land

"[A] rich debut . . . This is an impressive take on the wonders, terrors, and mundanities faced by those living under repression or political instability."--Publishers Weekly

"Orhan's striking, nuanced stories are set in a Turkey framed by oppression and sometimes the absurd."--Library Journal

About the Author

Kenan Orhan is a Turkish American writer and a recipient of the O. Henry Prize. His stories have appeared in The Paris Review, Massachusetts Review, Prairie Schooner, The Common, and elsewhere, and have been anthologized in The Best American Short Stories. Orhan received his MFA from Emerson College and lives in Kansas City. I Am My Country is his first book.