Elif Shafak’s There Are Rivers in the Sky follows a single raindrop in its course from its fall onto King Ashurbanipal’s beard in ancient Nineveh to 1840s London to present-day Iraq and London. The action flows between times and between the great rivers Tigris and Thames. Water fills the consciousness of the characters, from mudlarks on the Thames to Yazidi people forced to migrate from the Tigris to wealthy Iraqi transplants living along the Thames: the language is positively humid. And behind it all lies our oldest surviving poem, the Epic of Gilgamesh—collected in the library of Ashurbanipal, searched for by London scholars, collected again by antiquities collectors. Its tale of great human adventure, deep friendship, and deepest grief in the loss of a loved one still and always resonates. Shafak doesn’t retell the epic, but her characters live it.

This book grabbed me from its opening tale of Ashurbanipal’s contending love of his books and easy cruelty to his subjects. It’s often painful, especially as we see the cruelty continuing from Nineveh to London to Iraq to London again. But the water connects beauty and love as well, and the trip is worth the pain. There Are Rivers in the Sky left me grieving and rejoicing at once. You can’t ask for much more from a book.

Thank you, #Knopf, for providing this book for review consideration via NetGalley. All opinions are my own.
#ThereAreRiversintheSky #NetGalley

“Water remembers, it is humans who forget.”
Thank you NetGalley for the eARC!
This book was so interesting! It follows three different characters in completely different places. We have King Arthur, Narin, and Zaleekah. They’re all connected, because of course they are, but in the most surprising way! Of all things, it’s water that connects these three characters. Water remembers, after all.
I won’t spoil more of the plot!! This book was beautifully written truly lyrical and poetic, I adored the writing style and I thought the multiple plots were handled very well. It’s easy to get lost with multiple characters, but the author did a great job of balancing them without making the reader confused or letting urge characters blend together. The story itself is beautiful and intriguing.
I really enjoyed this book and I highly recommend it!

"There Are Rivers in the Sky" reads like an E.L. Doctorow novel. The author puts fictional characters alongside historical figures.

First up is Ashurbanipal, King of Mesopotamia in the 640s BCE. His favorite work in his library is a poem he knows by heart, The Epic of Gilgamesh.

Then comes Arthur Smyth, amended from George Smith, who first translated the Epic from tablets held at the British Museum in the 1870s.

Two modern day women round out the story. Narin is a 9-year old member of the persecuted Yazidi religion. Zaleekhah is an hydrologist who lives in London but traces her roots to Mesopotamia.

All feel the pull of water.

Elif Shafak has written another beautiful engrossing novel. I loved the characters the story a novel I will not forget and will be recommending.@netgalley @knopf

First of all, thanks to Knopf and Netgalley for the eARC of There Are Rivers in the Sky by Elif Shafak. The biggest positives of the novel are its magnificent worldbuilding and its brilliant characters. The novel encompasses three characters across centuries and wraps them up in an engrossing plot surrounding water, family, and traditions. I loved all three of the characters, Narin, Arthur, and Zaleekhah, whose lives you could fully envlop thanks to the words on the page. However, Arthur's story in particular was incredible and raised profound questions that lingered far after the soul-stirring climax. If you love historical fiction, this novel is an absolute must!

This book was absolutely beautiful and heartfelt,and at times harsh and sad. Elif shafak is an extraordinary author and I will read anything by them. Just a wonderful story

"When we are gone--kings, slaves, or scribes--what is left of us?"

Elif Shafak brings together the stories of three characters, two rivers, and a wide expanse of time into one story, which is the story of water. There Are Rivers in the Sky is another tour de force by Elif Shafak capturing the heart of humanity, the complexity of trauma and oppression, the beauty and breaking of history, and the hope that should propel us to work for the freeing of land and people.

"How does a people survive the painful realization that not only is their history full of oppression, persecution and massacres, but their future may also offer more of the same?"

Shafak challenges the reader to confront the experience of a marginalized people and what the pursuit of wealth and power can give and take away. While it takes some time to see the different pieces of the story coming together, it is worth every page. This is the kind of book that upon finishing it, leaves you awestruck and frozen for a minute. It is a feeling of, "Whoa. What do I even do now?" It is brilliant, unsettling, and an essential read. It is timely and thought-provoking.

"Those you love are your sanctuary, your shelter, your country and even, when it comes to that, your exile. Wherever they go, you will follow."

To anyone and everyone, I recommend this book. I am not one who typically likes books about ancient history or antiquities but this book made those things come alive for me. The journey with the characters and through a beautifully described geography made every page worth it.

Thank you Knopf and NetGalley for providing a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All opinions expressed in my review are my own.

This was an ambitious, well-written, and moving work, I'm glad I stumbled upon it. I found it to be very reminiscent of Cloud Cuckoo Land, with there being multiple POVs across time and space tied together by one central narrative. I even enjoyed each POV, which is pretty rare for me, there is usually one I'm less excited about. Arthur, Zaleekhah, and Narin each brought unique perspectives and story telling. Beyond just the main plot, which was very compelling on its own, I also learned a lot about Mesopotamia and 1800s London - a pleasant bonus!

I can't express how much I LOVED this book! I am in awe! One of the best books I have ever read. I can't say enough good things about this story. This will be a book that I will talk about forever!

Elif Shafak's There Are Rivers in the Sky is a triumph. I am a somewhat new reader of Shafak's novels, having only read The Island of Missing Trees (also a stunning novel), but this new book has made me a fan that will be adding her earlier works to my summer reading list.

There Are Rivers in the Sky follows three characters -- Arthur, Zaleekhah, and Narin -- through time and space, and provides the reader with not only a beautiful interconnected story, but a history lesson on Mesopotamia, nineteenth century London, and the atrocities Isis inflicts on whole communities.

This is a must-read book, and I'll be recommending it to book groups when it is released.

This novel follows three characters in three different timelines: Arthur, born into poverty in Dickens's London; Narin, a Yazidi girl living in Turkey with her father and grandmother in 2014; and Zaleekhah, a water scientist recently separated from her husband in London in 2018. These three seem entirely unrelated, but their lives all find a connection in water and in the culture of ancient Mesopotamia. Arthur finds success in being able to read cuneiform tablets unearthed by archaeologists and finds his life's passion in translating the epic poem of Gilgamesh. Narin, whose mother died and whose father travels for work, suffers from an illness that is rapidly taking her hearing, and as the Turkish government is planning construction that threatens to flood the village where she lives, her grandmother is determined to take her to an ancient holy city in Iraq to be baptized. Zaleekhah is trying to make a home on a rented houseboat and reflecting on the work of her late mentor, whose theory that water could retain memory destroyed his professional reputation, and of the rivers that have been buried over the centuries. Connecting these three storylines are the themes of memory, of hatred that arises from misunderstanding, and of the many important roles that water plays in life as well as the dual nature of all humans -- that even those who create beauty or knowledge are still capable of cruelty. I really enjoyed this book, though I found the characters to be a little flat and underdeveloped and would have liked to have gotten to know them better. I gave it 4 stars.

I received a digital ARC of this book from Knopf and NetGalley in return for an honest review. This book will be published August 20, 2024.

The narrative structure of this book is fantastically creative and hooked me on the storylines, the way they braided together and it was fun to look for all the connections between the plot-streams--reappearing objects and legends and history and lore. Some of it is deeply brutal and violent. Recommended but I couldn't read it voraciously at a stretch, instead had to ration it in smaller doses.

There are Rivers in the sky is Elif Shafak's best work. It expertly wove multiple stories across multiple generations with the theme of water throughout. The writing was rich with deep characterization.

I could not put this book down. It was a fabulous read. In her last novel, The Island of Missing Trees, Elif Shafak magnificently introduced a tree as a narrator. In this next novel she amazingly utilizes a drop of water to connect the ancient civilization of Mesopotamia to a contemporary timeline with a stop in the mid 1800s. This was brilliant. Although Shafak jumped from one timeline to the next, and back again, I had no difficulty following each story. And, I loved how she connected each by dropping little Easter eggs along the way. That technique really made me smile. The various timelines also provided a history lesson about the culture of the Middle East, particularly Iran. Shafak also included a storyline about climate change but not in a preachy way. I did not realize the length of the novel as I read it because the story held my interest throughout. I thank NetGalley for providing me with a copy of this novel. I’m sure it will be included in my book club groups after publication.

Man, I really wanted to enjoy this novel because I really enjoyed Elif Shafak's other works, but it didn't work for me.

There were moments that felt similar to Cloud Atlas, and that was a book I didn't enjoy. Elif Shafak's writing style is beautiful, but I don't think multi-generational novels are my thing. Bummer, because I did want to enjoy this. She had such a way with connecting her character to water, and that was the highlight for me.

Thanks to NetGalley and Knopf for an opportunity to read and review this book

This novel works on so many levels, it’s hard to know where to begin talking about it. This is a multilayered story that creates a cohesive whole. It is educational, emotional, and thought provoking. Where else can you find a story that begins in an ancient kingdom, threads through to a London of the 1800s and winds up in recent times? The theme naturally connects our history and knowledge of water as the source of life with power, class systems, religious war, family issues and the environment.

The story begins in Ninevah, an ancient city on the banks of the Tigris River. King Ashurbanipal is a ruthless leader but is also an intellectual. He built a great library that was believed to have been totally destroyed. A poem believed to have been lost in the library's destruction,, The Epic of Gilgamesh, is what binds together the lives of the novel’s three protagonists.

Arthur (referred to in his chapter headings as King Arthur of the Sewers and Slums) is born on the banks of a polluted Thames in 19th century London. His mother is mentally ill, his father an abusive drunk. But Arthur is born with a brilliant mind and infallible memory. This gift changes his life. He apprentices at a renowned publishing company. Once he finds the book, Ninevah and Its Remains, the course of his life is set

Narin’s story begins in 2014. She is a 10-year old Yazidi girl, born in Turkey. with a rare disorder that will result in deafness.. Narin is the last in the line of Yazidi healers. She is raised by a grandmother who cannot prevent the oncoming deafness but she teaches her Yazidi history and knowledge through stories. Yazidi life along the Tigris is being destroyed to make way for a new dam. Narin’s grandmother decides they will go to Iraq for her baptism in a sacred temple. Unbeknownst to the Yazidis who are being persecuted in Turkey, Isis is rising in Iraq.

The last character is a contemporary woman. It is 2018 and a newly separated hydrologist, Zaleekah, moves into a houseboat on the Thames. Her backstory is a sad one. Her parents are killed in a flash flood when she was seven and she was raised by a wealthy uncle. She is deeply depressed and is contemplating suicide when we meet her.

I was immersed in the stories of each character, particularly Arthur. His assent from impoverished to renowned is fascinating. But I could not imagine how or if these stories would eventually intersect. But it does in the hands of this beautiful and brilliant writer. The prose itself is spellbinding but more importantly, I came away from the novel with a better understanding of our environmental abyss and how we are all connected by a single drop of water.

It is a memorable story in the hands of a writer up to this daunting challenge.
Highly recommend.,
Many thanks to Netgalley and Knopf for the opportunity to read this advanced reading copy and provide an impartial review.

I really wanted to like this book; I like Elif Shafak a lot, and the idea of reading a book that spanned across multiple eras was right up my alley.

Unfortunately, I really disliked this book, for two reasons:
1. I didn’t particularly like any of the three main characters. Moreover, their individual stories weren’t captivating; I found myself needed to reread the same page a few times because my eyes glazed over. Sometimes, if one character is stronger than the others, it’s okay, because you can speed read through the weaker characters’ chapters to get to the stronger character’s story. This was not the case with this book, where all the characters were weak.
2. The three characters felt disparate. I understand how they were supposed to connect, but it was a weak tie (or too subtle for my understanding). There was no “aha” moment where it all came together. Instead, every time the point of view changed, I felt as though I had been dropped into an entirely separate story.


I am disappointed, because I really was looking forward to this story. In some ways, I think this novel would have been better as three different novellas, not one story.

I was provided an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This story begins in Mesopotania- An ancient region of southwestern Asia in present day Iraq lying between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers. It is told through the development of early writing on clay tablets and the discovery of these tablets and the deciphering of The Epic of Gilgamesh. It is wonderfully written through the lives of King Arthur of the sewers and slums in London in 1840, Narin and her grandmother in Iraq in 2014 and Zaleekhah in London in 2018. It is very well written and offers much thought provoking and brilliant ideas and truths!!

I didn't like this novel nearly as much as her "10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World", but it was still really well done. I especially loved the way she intricately traces the life of water. I did, however, struggle with the ways in which the main characters were connected through history.

Elif Shafak is one of my favorite authors. Her depth of knowledge is remarkable. The book begins in ancient Mesopotamia with a drop of water and braids a story of three characters and two rivers with the one drop of water that starts the story. The reader travels from Iraq to London and back to Iraq. There is Arthur, born in poverty on the banks of the Thames in the 19th century, his passion is translating the ancient tiles of the epic Gilgamesh, Narin, a Yazidi girl who is to be baptized in the Tirgris in 2014 and is caught on her journey in a terrible, tragic genocide. Zaleekhah is a Hydrologist living on a houseboat on the Thames in 2018. The lives are complex, but the theme that there is no humanity without water is strong and consistent. Water is really the main character in this novel.
The writing is beautiful and some of the chapters feel like a fable. I learned a lot about Iraq and the Yazidi who I had not heard of. It is not a quick read and there were times I wished for more plot or that I felt more connected to the characters. That said, it's an amazing, one of a kind novel.
Thank you to Netgally and Penguin Random House books for an opportunity to read and review this book.