Martyr!

A Novel

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • SHORTLISTED FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD • ONE OF THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW'S 10 BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR • A TIME MUST-READ BOOK OF THE YEAR • A newly sober, orphaned son of Iranian immigrants, guided by the voices of artists, poets, and kings, embarks on a remarkable search for a family secret that leads him to a terminally ill painter living out her final days in the Brooklyn Museum. Electrifying, funny, and wholly original, Martyr! heralds the arrival of an essential new voice in contemporary fiction.

“Kaveh Akbar is one of my favorite writers. Ever.” —Tommy Orange, Pulitzer Prize–nominated author of There There

“The best novel you'll ever read about the joy of language, addiction, displacement, martyrdom, belonging, homesickness.” —Lauren Groff, best-selling author of Matrix and Fates and Furies

Cyrus Shams is a young man grappling with an inheritance of violence and loss: his mother’s plane was shot down over the skies of the Persian Gulf in a senseless accident; and his father’s life in America was circumscribed by his work killing chickens at a factory farm in the Midwest. Cyrus is a drunk, an addict, and a poet, whose obsession with martyrs leads him to examine the mysteries of his past—toward an uncle who rode through Iranian battlefields dressed as the angel of death to inspire and comfort the dying, and toward his mother, through a painting discovered in a Brooklyn art gallery that suggests she may not have been who or what she seemed.

Kaveh Akbar’s Martyr! is a paean to how we spend our lives seeking meaning—in faith, art, ourselves, others.

Remarkable

Martyr! is remarkable. Powerful writing that captures that particular existential moment of late youth, when the first whiffs of mortality render everything in life so...consequential. Kaveh Akbar's novel is ambitious and painstakingly crafted. Its dizzying poetic language is used intentionally and precisely to great effect. Philosophy and reverie dominate. His erudite voice is saved from pretentiousness only by its authenticity. And the narration! Arian Moayed's performance is emotional and lush. His voice is luxury cashmere, soft, light, warm, with an earthy goat-iness that climbs through. I can't imagine experiencing this book except through his voice. I fell in love a little. Okay, a lot. Completely surrendered. It was sublime. This one will haunt my heart and mind for a long time. Excellent!

Did not like narrator

I found the narration distracting. Really surprised more people didn’t comment on this in the reviews. Weird inflections - random word emphasis - did not read naturally

It’s good to be alive

Loved the twist but also the language and the misanthropy and the recovery. Beautiful open searching book.

Odd

This book was not it for me. There are parts that are beautifully written, but it was not an easy listen. I love Abraham Verghese books and I thought maybe this would be similarly written, but it was really hard to follow and the characters were just odd. The ambiguous ending was the last straw for me. I'm sure for some this book is it, but I wanted to leave my review because I was disappointed that I used a credit to listen and I don't feel that everyone will enjoy the book as much as some of those who left rave reviews did. I sure didn't. Maybe I'm just too dumb!

Brilliant

Brilliant. Well written, inventive, funny, touching, riveting. The intersecting stories are too numerous to list – it’s about missing parents, martyrdom, art, poetry, exile, drug addition, friends, lovers, life and death. All at the same time. Almost too brilliant for its own good in places. Feels like an editor worked on it for a while then just gave up and said publish it anyway, it is too good no to. It was also incredibly well read. A treat!