Sultan's Harem / 1-4000-8312-5"The Sultan's Harem" is a spectacular tale of hatred and revenge, as Falconer weaves the tale of a single woman - a slave of the most powerful man in the world - who tears down a powerful empire by careful manipulation of the man who loves her. This one woman, Hurrem, manages to take down an entire empire, all while only ever being seen by a handful of men - the sultan and his personal eunuchs. Falconer makes it difficult not to admire our cold-blooded heroine, who staunchly refuses to be a good little harem girl and concubine to the man who bought her from her parents. She despises the man who tore her from her home as just another bauble to add to his vast harem, and whom she must amuse endlessly lest she be tossed callously aside for another girl in the harem. If she must play the game of harem politics to survive, she will play it - but survival is too meager a goal for her. Carefully and coldly, she devises a plan to bear a child, remove the Sultan's favorite, entice him to fall in love with her, and then secure her freedom and unprecedented marriage to the emperor. Even as a wife, she is still a slave in everything but name, and she ruthlessly turns her mental hold on her husband to send him spiraling into madness while the kingdom collapses slowly around him.Falconer carefully treads the personal and the political here, as with all his novels, and we see sympathetic glimpses into both the main players (sultan and sultana) and into the lives of the hapless girls living silently in his lavish harem. Each girl has her own history, her own loss, and her own sadness, and - faced with the realities of the harem, and of the monogamous sultan - finds her own pastimes and petty jealousies. Are these women better off than the ones on the outside? They are safe and pampered baubles in a collection of sex slaves that are almost never "used" by their relatively monogamous master. But the silence and loneliness gnaws at their souls and the passage of time weighs heavily on all involved. Is our dark heroine really so unusual in her hate and cruelty, or are her sisters in the harem just as enraged but powerless to act out? Gripping and suspenseful, "The Sultan's Harem" is a compelling read - I could not put it down. I agree with another reviewer in that the story would make a wonderful movie, should anyone ever acquire the rights. Like other Falconer novels, the writing is frank and does not shy away from the facts of life, but the writing is never lurid or vulgar. ~ Ana Mardoll
This is more the tale of three very different women than the tale of Suleiman, but the thought is definitely there. We hear not only from him, but from the three women the story focuses on: Hürrem, Gülbehar and Julia.First off we get the story of Hürrem’s rise to power within the harem. Since Suleiman truly loved Gülbehar, she used every trick in the book to steal him away from his favourite. Like so many stories that take place in the harem, the ladies in here are not necessarily sympathetic, but they are interesting. No one can deny Hürrem is a forceful person that will do anything, including kill, to gain power. Most of the book is from her perspective, although we do see things from Gülbehar’s perspective as she watches as she’s displaced as Suleiman’s favourite, knowing she can do nothing about it.While Hürrem’s story was the main focus and it was fascinating, the story of Julia, the Italian who is captured and taken to the harem as a concubine is my favourite. We don’t see her until the last part of the story, but she is my absolute favourite character and couldn’t be a more stark contrast to the scheming, sometimes sadistic Hürrem. Her story and that of poor, poor Abbas are inexplicably entwined and how their story is resolved is both heartbreaking and happy.I can’t and certainly won’t comment on the historical accuracy of Harem. In his author’s note, Colin Falconer admits that the three main women in the novel and their actions are pretty much pure speculation but that Suleiman was of course a very real person. Seeing as I know essentially nothing about Suleiman’s empire, I also won’t comment on the day-to-day minor historical details either. I will note that I don’t think Colin Falconer’s main objective with this novel was to be as historically accurate as possible, meaning he likely gave himself a little wiggle room when it came to details.My only real complaint about the novel is that for such a good book, the proofreading was not so great. There were your vs. you’re mistakes sometimes and simple proofreading errors that looked like typos (lanbguage instead of language). There weren’t so many that it detracted from the story, but just keep in mind that they are there.I give this book 4/5 stars.
What do You think about The Sultan's Harem (2005)?
Kitabı okumak istiyorsanız yazarın hayal gücüne dayandığını bilmelisiniz adı üstünde "masal". Kitap bir kurgu romanı ve gerçekle alakası olduğunu düşünmüyorum hatta en azından küçücük bir gerçeklik payı vardır deseniz de okumayın çünkü gerçekten yok. Zaten yazarın yabancı olması da bize bir nevi bunu kanıtlıyor. Kitapta abartmalar var ayrıca Hürrem ile alakalı olmayan çok farklı bir hikayeyi de kitabın içine yerleştirmeyi çalışmışlar, olmamış. Acaba aralarında bir bağ var mı diye okumaya devam etmeme rağmen iki hikaye arasında en ufak bir bağlantı bile yok. Yazar iki ayrı kitap çıkarsaydı daha mantıklı olurdu çünkü bu noktada Hürrem figürünü dikkat çekmek için kullanmış ancak Hürrem'le alakası olmayan kendi hikayesini pazarlamaya çalışmış gibi duruyor. Ben beğenmedim. İsterseniz okuyup bir de siz karar verin.
—Vera
There were parts of this novel that were hard to get through, but in its entirety, I loved it. I am a sucker for anything to do with Turkey and Istanbul after living there, and I love exploring history I've studied through fiction.Falconer obviously took many, many, many artistic liberties with his novel, but I found his portrayal of the atmosphere and characters a great strength. I could really picture the ancient city with its tiny alleys and mish-mash of diversity, as well as the magnificence of the palace and mosques. Touring these places more than a year ago and then reading stories of people living there and building them brings them to life in a way a recorded tour guide headset never could. So people commenting about historical inaccuracies: it's a fictional work. If you want history, go to Istanbul and tour the harem or read something nonfiction.That being said, I loved most of this book! The characters complemented each other well and the injustices among people are realistically exemplify social issues during Ottoman times. I loved Hurrem's complexity--in one way, I found her to be a completely heartless bitch, but she also was a genius in rising to power as a woman. How else could you do that in a patriarchy except for with cunning blackmail and trickery? Suleyman was likable but frustrating, Gulbehar was pitiful, and the stories of the children were fascinating. My heart ached for Abbas and Sirhane was underdeveloped. Anyways, I liked most of them and how they played off of each other. The book mostly kept my interest, except for a few slow parts, and I highly recommend it.
—Lareesa
Very interesting! This is a time period & part of the world that I've done very little reading about, and it was thus intriguingly foreign to enter the world of the harem, and compelling to read about it. I will probably be looking for other titles to continue exploring this time and place. (Though sadly it appears that the follow-on book, Seraglio, isn't yet available in ebook format. I guess I'll have to wait until it's converted to figure out what else will happen to the people inhabiting this story! (Note that the end comes rather abruptly in what seems to be mid-plot, so it may end up feeling unresolved to you.)
—Kjirstin
