What happens when you live in a world where it is dangerous to be who you are? Dangerous meaning that you risk your life to be alive? To even exist? When you suppress parts of your identity, they implode and explode in flourishings that carry you for the rest of your life.

Sinaki has a poet's tongue, skillful in the way he mixes memories with metaphor, every action is an art:

"𝘚𝘦𝘦 𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘸𝘦 𝘴𝘵𝘰𝘰𝘥 𝘪𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘤𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘳𝘺 𝘳𝘢𝘪𝘯, 𝘯𝘢𝘮𝘦𝘥 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘪𝘵𝘴 𝘵𝘢𝘴𝘵𝘦? 𝘐 𝘥𝘳𝘢𝘯𝘬 𝘦𝘯𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩 𝘶𝘯𝘵𝘪𝘭 𝘐 𝘨𝘳𝘦𝘸 𝘴𝘪𝘤𝘬 𝘰𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘯𝘦𝘴𝘴. 𝘠𝘰𝘶 𝘬𝘪𝘴𝘴𝘦𝘥 𝘮𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘨𝘦𝘵 𝘮𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘴𝘵𝘰𝘱. 𝘈 𝘴𝘪𝘯𝘨𝘭𝘦 𝘳𝘰𝘴𝘦 𝘨𝘳𝘰𝘸𝘴 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘥𝘢𝘺 𝘸𝘦 𝘵𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘱𝘢𝘴𝘴𝘦𝘥 𝘵𝘰 𝘴𝘦𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘚𝘶𝘭𝘵𝘢𝘯𝘢 𝘦𝘤𝘭𝘪𝘱𝘴𝘦. 𝘛𝘰 𝘩𝘪𝘥𝘦, 𝘸𝘦 𝘴𝘸𝘢𝘺𝘦𝘥 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘨𝘳𝘢𝘷𝘦𝘴𝘵𝘰𝘯𝘦𝘴 𝘥𝘶𝘳𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘦𝘢𝘳𝘵𝘩𝘲𝘶𝘢𝘬𝘦. 𝘗𝘦𝘳𝘩𝘢𝘱𝘴 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘢𝘳𝘦 𝘡𝘢𝘩𝘢𝘬 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘐 𝘢𝘮 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘵𝘸𝘰 𝘴𝘯𝘢𝘬𝘦𝘴, 𝘮𝘦 𝘢𝘴 𝘢 𝘸𝘰𝘮𝘢𝘯 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘮𝘦 𝘢𝘴 𝘢 𝘮𝘢𝘯. 𝘐 𝘱𝘶𝘭𝘭 𝘢𝘸𝘢𝘺 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘬𝘪𝘴𝘴. 𝘞𝘦 𝘥𝘰𝘯’𝘵 𝘵𝘶𝘳𝘯 𝘵𝘰 𝘴𝘵𝘰𝘯𝘦."

And it's beautiful to see love like this.
It's beautiful to see yearning like this.

It's beautiful in the ways when under oppression comes a suppression that falls hard on itself to allow you to touch more finely, more intentionally. Sinaki creates music out of touch, creates song from a kiss. Sex as symphony. Sex, also, as a ways of survival for the queer body in this respect.

For those that enjoy poetry and prose in the novel form, this one is meant to captivate.

𝘐 𝘳𝘦𝘮𝘦𝘮𝘣𝘦𝘳 𝘢𝘴𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘰𝘯𝘤𝘦 𝘪𝘯 𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘩𝘢𝘳𝘭𝘦𝘲𝘶𝘪-𝘯𝘢𝘥𝘦, "𝘊𝘢𝘯 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘭𝘰𝘷𝘦 𝘮𝘦 𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳?"
𝘠𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘱𝘰𝘯𝘴𝘦: 𝘐 𝘤𝘢𝘯 𝘶𝘯𝘵𝘪𝘭 𝘐 𝘤𝘢𝘯'𝘵. 𝘐 𝘸𝘪𝘭𝘭 𝘶𝘯𝘵𝘪𝘭 𝘐 𝘸𝘰𝘯'𝘵.

This is an incredibly beautiful book that shines a spotlight on the persecution faced by queer and trans people in modern-day Iran. Though there are moments of laugh-out-loud wit, it is overall a quite dark and somber book, so I think you need to be in the right mood to enjoy this one. The plot progresses slowly at the beginning before sharply escalating toward the end of the book. The prose is absolutely gorgeous, and the way the author draws parallels between ancient myths and the book’s characters will delight mythology fans. I love books that pull me out of my world and into another culture, and I enjoyed the dynamic and stereotype-defying characters.

Overall, this story was masterfully told and I would definitely recommend it to lovers of lit fic.

DNF @ 52%
This is very boring for a mystery/thriller. The main character is the most passive character; he doesn’t do anything and he doesn’t even have anything to say, really. The mythology element is hardly there, and the roses and snakes motif is almost to the point of overkill.

Thank you to NetGalley and Grove Atlantic for the ARC!

Anjir and Zal are childhood best friends who discovered their sexuality together and have grown into adult lovers. But in Tehran, being openly gay is an offense punishable by death, both in the actual law and the law of society. Zal has married a woman but the pair have long dreamed of escaping Iran to be together. Medusa of the Roses picks up as their plan might finally become reality.

The ups and downs of their complicated relationship is told as a noir. I rate it a 3--it's really more of a 3.5. I loved the journey of the story and the way it was told, but the ending came on too quickly and became rather trite. I'm owing some of this to playing into the cheesy side of a noir, but it just didn't fit the rest of the book.

thank you netgalley and the publisher for allowing me to read this book!
this is a great debut as far as they go
zal and anjir are everything honestly, reading about their troubles and tribulations in modern day iran is honestly eye opening. excited to see more

Beautiful, almost achingly so. Thoroughly entertained by the beautiful prose to the finish line. Thank you for the opportunity.

The prose is very well written and the story was immersive enough to keep me engaged. 3 stars overall

Thank you to netgalley for the ARC!

This was more like a 3.5. This takes place in Iran and it's LGBTQ+ rep. I'm just not sure if I loved it. I enjoyed it. Let's leave it at that. It's also got Greek mythology for those who love that stuff like myself.

I wish I enjoyed this book more, but I just think it wasn’t meant for me. I found it hard to follow & a bit dense. The cinematic prose was great. I really liked the way the novel was written but I came out of it not really understanding why the characters did what they did or who they really were. It didn’t seem like Anjir really had any character development, the only thing I know is how sexually active they are. I would have liked to know some motivation behind the characters actions or some description of their personalities.

thank you Grove Atlantic & Netgalley for the eARC

One thing I find interesting is that the summary of the book mentions that the book is steeped in Greek and Persian mythology. How that comes across is through metaphors and analogies that happen more often than I was expecting, or than I found enjoyable. This would often feel shoehorned in, a moment of "see how this relates to this myth? or this other myth? look at the parallels I'm drawing!" It felt less poetic than I hoped for, and more forced.

The book deals with fascinating, important topics, and is generally good, but I found myself distracted by the way that the author consistently told me what myth I was supposed to be thinking about at all times.

Thank you NetGalley and Grove Atlantic for providing me with an e-arc of this book.

Medusa of the roses is a troubled story of queer lovers. I was so curious and enthusiastic to read this book, but for me it didn’t get through.
It promised a lot, but somewhere in between the confusing writing style and the messy plot, it felt a lot like chaos.
The final plot twist I think I would have loved if the whole story was better told.
In the end, one good thing about the heavy tone and the messy thoughts, is that it communicates the tortured love of the MC.

With a strong political message, queer in a way in which the lyrical richness of the lyrics is approached from Greco-Roman and Persian references.

The details were the forte of the book, some of those who read this book felt that the story fell "short" and could have exploited more thoroughly the conflicts of the plot. Maybe if the editor had something to do with it, I would have chosen to propose a "prose and verse" story if I were you.

I recommend it if you want a Queer Persian read, with a picturesque aesthetic with detailed descriptions and heartfelt stories.

I really enjoyed this book. I will give my full opinions on it later when I am not drowning in my tbr list.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing an ebook copy of this!
I was so excited about this and I definitely think it's a good book but I personally found it extremely triggering. That is probably my fault for not doing more research about the story before reading. I would like to give it another try in the future since I think it has a lot of potential to become one of my favourite books but as of now it's just not it.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC of this novel.

Anjir and Zal have been friends their whole lives, and in adulthood are in a relationship, but in Iran being a gay man is dangerous, and when Zal is attacked, Anjir decides to persue a transition to become a woman because in Iran, although being gay is criminalized, transitioningin order to live life with your partner is preferred and legal (although still comes with an element of danger).
The exploration of homophobia and how it effects members of the community who don't conform to heteronormativity is well done, and prompted me to descend into a Google hole researching Iran and the politics that influence the way people can live their lives.
I found Anjir's relationship with gender and attachment to mythology to be deeply interesting and even relatable on some levels.

I found the writing style of this book to be quite lovely and that has me very interested to read more of this authors writing in the future. Sinaki's way of describing elements in the story is lush and lyrical, and the allusions to various mythologies and literature were nicely done.

I did find it a bit overly sexual but I don't prefer books that are very sexual so that's a problem with me and not the book itself, and the prose and plot kept me interested and reading.

Looking forward to more from this author.

I haven't read a book in 1st person perspective for so long. This was fun and confusing. I enjoyed the overall story as best as I could understand it. The different scenes were interesting and I learned a lot about different people's lives.

My biggest complaint is that I still don't know what the main character's motives were. Or even why they did what they did. Right before writing this review I read through the premise again and that's when everything made more sense - which feels like a writing issue. Someone shouldn't be dependant on your blurb/summary to understand the contents.

My secondary complaint is slightly more nitpicky - I wish they included more description of settings. There's plenty of descriptions of sex and what reminded the main character of a sexual memory, but not enough of the scenes and life around. Occasionally these sexual memories are out-of-pocket or unnecessary but they don't add life to the scene. I understand the main character is a very sexual person but all I know about certain areas is where they jerked off, not really what they look or feel like.

Very interesting read!

~Thanks Grove Atlantic via Netgalley for the ebook.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for providing me with a free e-arc. This was such a special story with a rawness and tenderness woven into it that touched me so deeply. The language was lovely, the pain of the main characters both relatable and terrifying.

Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with a free copy in exchange for an honest review.

Let me start by saying that I really wanted to love this. And I tried. The synopsis intrigued me to no end, and I was so excited to start reading it, but the story fell flat before I was halfway through.

Medusa of the Roses follows Anjir, a gay man living in a very homophobic Iran, where becoming - yes, becoming - transgender and living as a woman is accepted but being gay is not. In fact, the government prefers men surgically transitioning to women over a man being gay. Anjir spends most of the novel looking for his boyfriend, who disappeared right before the beginning and who flickers in and out of Anjir's life throughout. Being gay in a country such as Iran is unimaginably tough, and this review is in no way intended to undermine that experience.

Sinaki's prose is cinematic and poetic, containing lots of allusions to different mythologies and classic literature. And while I enjoyed his style, it also felt as if he was determined to put as many memorable quotes into the novel as he could within 240 pages. The writing style is extremely somber and melancholic, which, after a while, becomes dense and more difficult to read.

The plot itself was heartbreaking, which fit the style of narration perfectly, but even for someone who often reads sorrowful novels with unhappy endings, this was a bit much. There is not a ray of sunshine in Anjir's life, even at the moments he reunites with Zal - his lover. However, the plot itself was not the element I had an issue with. In fact, together with the imagery of Iran and allusions, it saved the novel from a two-star rating. That, and the very unexpected plottwist. The main problem I had with this novel is the over-sexualisation. Anjir found an internal sexual relation to almost every character and object apart from his family and because of this, his character fell a little flat. His only characterisation is that he is a very sexually active gay man, and I wanted more than that.

Perhaps I went in with too many expectations or this novel just wasn't meant for me, but I expected more. I will say, however, that Sinaki is a very talented artist.

The book start very strongly and I was directly invested or more specifically disturbed - and as a result I wanted to understand
But the more the story progressed the more I find myself not liking the book
I was intrigued by the synopsis, but the actual content was over the top. I read a lot of gay books with a destructive-codependent relationship, and this one was definitely push to the extreme.
anjir’s transition felt unexpected and simply to feed the plot of the book, this is a touchy subject and I’m not directly concerned so I’m not going to speak any further
I can’t say that I love the characters but I was really intrigued by their story
Thank you net galley for the copy

I started the book with an expectation, of course I did. I wanted to read something queer. The book was different from what I had expected and gave me quite something to chew. Nevertheless, I found the story of Anjir and Zal touching and disturbing. The story felt like the first time I saw "Drive" in theater. Poetic and calm and then out of nowhere something ugly and bone crushing.

I can't say how much of the story is Own-Voice, in parts it certainly is? Maybe? At the same time, it's literature that I think is meant to entertain rather than shake people up, although it certainly does the latter. Because violence against queer people exists and it forces people to make drastic decisions and live complicated lives in dark corners. It's also important to me to say that the book is quite cruel towards women, that Anjir decides to change his nature for questionable reasons and that the contempt and spite he shows towards his lover is heavy in places. The book may not be suitable for those who are sensitive to such topics. As I said at the beginning, Anjir is very ruthless with everyone, including himself, and his view of the world is very melancholy and morbid. The reasons for this are understandable and emotions in both directions are strong catalysts. Linguistically, the story is poetic and abysmal, emotional and ugly and in some moments so unpleasantly disarmingly direct that it hurts.

I liked the book. I cannot say I enjoyed it, bc that sounds so wrong, yet the same time it was a world I never saw before, bc I am so safe in my bubble and in my world and therefore I liked it very much. A book feels good to me if it moves me, and this story certainly did. I thought about it for a long time after the last page, I dealt with the fables mentioned in the book and the politics of the country, I googled the author and learned a lot. Of course I wish there were more queer stories with beautiful endings, but who am I to judge this aspect. Of course, there has to be room for these narratives and, detached from this aspect, the book is impressive in terms of the images and metaphors and dialogues.

TY for giving me the opportunity to read this before its officially published.