Orhan Pamuk: SNOW

Most of the events in Orhan Pamuk's Snow took place in a Turkish town calles Kars during the dead of winter when heavy snow almost buried the town isolating it from the rest of the world. The roads were obscured and the trains couldn't run. The protagonist, a poet called Ka, who lived in polical exile in Germany, arrived in Kars, just before the roads became impassable, to attend a family funeral and, on the sideline, to cover the local elections and investigate about the horrifying epidemic of suicide among local girls.

The author, awarded the 2006 Nobel Prize in Lterature, writes with mastery so impressive that tensions that go along with clash of cultures and beliefs, which the book is partly about, can be felt in almost every page. The book also tackles the subject of happiness, family loyalties and writer's block.

I like the book very much. It gave light on some religious customs, e.g., Muslim girls wearing headscarfs. It's not an easy read for me. It's in a way difficult because I read the pocketbook edition of the novel with fonts too small for my not-so-well vision even with spectacles on. It's quite dense; however, the reading experience is rewarding. I'm glad I was not discouraged by the book's thickness.

Rating: 5.0/5.0

{25 March 2010}