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The Bastard of Istanbul
- Narrated by: Laural Merlington
- Length: 12 hrs and 38 mins
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Publisher's summary
At its center is the "bastard" of the title, Asya, a 19-year-old woman who loves Johnny Cash and the French Existentialists, and the four sisters of the Kazanci family, who all live together in an extended household in Istanbul. They include Zehila, the zestful, headstrong youngest sister, who runs a tattoo parlor and is Asya's mother; Banu, who has newly discovered herself as a clairvoyant; Cevriye, a widowed high-school teacher; and Feride, a hypochondriac obsessed with impending disaster. Their one (estranged) brother lives in Arizona with his wife and her Armenian daughter, Armanoush. When Armanoush secretly flies to Istanbul in search of her identity, she finds the Kazanci sisters and becomes fast friends with Asya. A secret is uncovered that links the two families and ties them to the 1915 Armenian deportations and massacres.
Full of vigorous, unforgettable female characters, The Bastard of Istanbul is a bold, powerful tale that will confirm Shafak as a rising star of international fiction.
Critic reviews
"Beautifully imagined....This wonderful new novel carried me away." (The Chicago Tribune)
"A saucy, witty, dramatic, and affecting tale in the spirit of novels by Amy Tan, Julia Alvarez, and Bharati Mukherjee." (New York Newsday)
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Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall
- Barbara
- 11-07-07
A tender gift from far away
I was pleasantly surprised at the warmth and humor in this novel. The author's gift for language is extraordinary, and she manages to convey the lives of Turkish women of multiple generations in a manner that conveys all of their humanity, wit and resourcefulness. The characters remain very true to themselves throughout the book. While there isn't a sneaky "surprise" ending, this isn't meant to be a whodunit. There is a mystery to be resolved, and the story wraps up nicely. The gentle insertion of the recent histories of the Turkish and Armenian people, which plays so heavily in the lives of those people in every day life, is a boon to the average American reader.
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14 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Jaxcat
- 04-20-07
Istanbul lives
Having been to Istanbul recently, this book brought back a lot of memories. The place is alive, in real life as in the book. The story for me was a little slow at first, the characters didn't really come to life until the second half of the book- but when they did, it was wonderful.
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13 people found this helpful
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Overall
- nvgolfdude
- 07-16-07
Interesting Theme
This was a very well written book with a complex plot, characters, and a surprise message. I would highly recommend it.
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6 people found this helpful
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Overall
- John
- 09-16-09
great story, very irritating narrator
a well thought of story that is full of culture and history. As for the narrator (with all due respect), she got me so irritated listening to her trying to imitate foreign accents, imitate male voices, pronouncing Turkish and Armenians names, ethnic food...etc. For some reason the narrator stopped using her fake and irritating accent for people in Istanbul. That was a great relief for my ears but made me wonder why she chose to talk in a heavy accent reading speeches by Armenian Americans in the US. I am not sure how many more "Anti Banu" phrase i could handle pronouncing the Banu in a such an irritating way!!!
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5 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Mary C
- 03-27-08
History 101
Throughout this book I could not get away from the feeling that the author's sole objective was to write about the history of the Armenian genocide in Turkey. The story was a vehicle for her history lesson and she manipulated it to enable the characters to give political speeches. The narrative stops dead with each one of these. She deals well, however, with the longing and search for identity of people from mixed cultures and the suffocating intimacy of these Middle Eastern families. The most interesting part for me was the depiction of how family experiences and retold history can shape younger generations' attitudes and beliefs in the same way that nations can manipulate access to information to do the same thing. The attachment to victimhood as part of a national, cultural identity, even when no longer justified, was an interesting aspect. I found many of the characters implausable, unappealing, and/or irritating. The second half of the book was far more engaging than the beginning as she got more focused on the narrative.
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4 people found this helpful
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- Amazon Customer
- 07-06-17
Beautiful Book, Poor Narration
If you could sum up The Bastard of Istanbul in three words, what would they be?
Beautifully written book that grasped my attention from the very first page and kept me engaged until the end. I was left wanting more at the end.
What other book might you compare The Bastard of Istanbul to and why?
I can compare this book to And The Mountains Echoed. It is written in much the same style, covering generations and periods of war.
How could the performance have been better?
The story carried it self, otherwise I would be very annoyed by the narrator. Her pronunciation of many significant Turkish words were particularly cringe worthy. I can say this from experience as one of the characters is given my own name and I had to bare it being pronounced wrong and in various ways through out the book.
If you could rename The Bastard of Istanbul, what would you call it?
I would not pick any other name, but if I had to choose...The Women of Istanbul
Any additional comments?
I felt the last chapter was condensed and the ending left me wanting more.
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3 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Lanakila
- 08-21-07
Passed the Time Nicely
This book passed the time nicely enough during my 2 hour daily commute, but it wasn't exactly riveting. The characters were fleshed out nicely and the author captured the oddities that families endure, and learn to endear, but the end was easy enough to see coming.
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3 people found this helpful
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- Catherine
- 05-30-15
another wonderful story from shafak
Sad, engaging and inspiring, The Bastard of Istanbul hooked me quickly. The story is of strong women and touches apon the Armenian deportation from Turkey. If you are going to visit Turkey, read a couple of El if Shafak's novels as a wonderful introduction to the rich history and culture of this country. Perhaps you will fall in love with it, as I have.
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2 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Shery
- 10-27-09
The Bastard of Istanbul
The book that you never forget!
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2 people found this helpful
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- Ev Si
- 08-24-15
Perhaps It Would've Better As A Book
I just couldn't get into this - the story goes on and on and more than halfway through, the plot was still unclear. The Armenian cultural and historical references are very interesting but as the book goes on, the history bit became repetitive. I enjoyed the author's description of the characters - authentic and on point with the Armenian culture. The narrating was not the best fit. I wanted to like this but I found it dragged...
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Story
Two teenagers, a Greek Cypriot and a Turkish Cypriot, meet at a taverna on the island they both call home. In the taverna, hidden beneath garlands of garlic, chili peppers and creeping honeysuckle, Kostas and Defne grow in their forbidden love for each other. A fig tree stretches through a cavity in the roof, and this tree bears witness to their hushed, happy meetings and eventually, to their silent, surreptitious departures. The tree is there when war breaks out, when the capital is reduced to ashes and rubble, and when the teenagers vanish.
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WOW! What a great story and narration!
- By Marcy on 12-02-21
By: Elif Shafak
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Honor
- By: Elif Shafak
- Narrated by: Mozhan Marno, Piter Marik
- Length: 12 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
An honor killing shatters and transforms the lives of Turkish immigrants in 1970s London. Internationally best-selling Turkish author Elif Shafak’s new novel is a dramatic tale of families, love, and misunderstandings that follows the destinies of twin sisters born in a Kurdish village. While Jamila stays to become a midwife, Pembe follows her Turkish husband, Adem, to London, where they hope to make new lives for themselves and their children. In London, they face a choice: stay loyal to the old traditions or try their best to fit in.
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Complex but Compelling
- By Cariola on 04-14-13
By: Elif Shafak
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10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World
- By: Elif Shafak
- Narrated by: Alix Dunmore
- Length: 9 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
A moving novel on the power of friendship in our darkest times, from internationally renowned writer and speaker Elif Shafak. In the pulsating moments after she has been murdered and left in a dumpster outside Istanbul, Tequila Leila enters a state of heightened awareness. Her heart has stopped beating, but her brain is still active - for 10 minutes 38 seconds. While the Turkish sun rises and her friends sleep soundly nearby, she remembers her life - and the lives of others, outcasts like her.
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Unique and unforgettable adventure in Istanbul
- By Zu-Zu on 11-24-20
By: Elif Shafak
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The Architect's Apprentice
- By: Elif Shafak
- Narrated by: Piter Marek
- Length: 16 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
In 1540, 12-year-old Jahan arrives in Istanbul. As an animal tamer in the sultan's menagerie, he looks after the exceptionally smart elephant Chota and befriends (and falls for) the sultan's beautiful daughter Princess Mihrimah. A palace education leads Jahan to Mimar Sinan, the empire's chief architect, who takes Jahan under his wing as they construct (with Chota's help) some of the most magnificent buildings in history.
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I feel like I should like it more than I do
- By nyog on 04-19-17
By: Elif Shafak
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The Forty Rules of Love
- A Novel of Rumi
- By: Elif Shafak
- Narrated by: Laural Merlington
- Length: 11 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
In this follow-up to her acclaimed 2007 novel The Bastard of Istanbul, Turkish author Elif Shafak unfolds two tantalizing parallel narratives---one contemporary and the other set in the 13th century, when Rumi encountered his spiritual mentor, the whirling dervish known as Shams of Tabriz---that together incarnate the poet's timeless message of love.
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Horrible reader
- By HI on 07-05-19
By: Elif Shafak
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Three Daughters of Eve
- By: Elif Shafak
- Narrated by: Alix Dunmore
- Length: 10 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Set across Istanbul and Oxford, from the 1980s to the present day, Three Daughters of Eve is a sweeping tale of faith and friendship, tradition and modernity, love and an unexpected betrayal. Peri, a wealthy Turkish housewife and mother, is on her way to a dinner party at a seaside mansion in Istanbul when a beggar snatches her handbag. As she wrestles to get it back, a photograph falls to the ground - an old polaroid of three young women and their university professor.
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Review 3 daughters of Eve
- By CA on 04-28-18
By: Elif Shafak
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The Island of Missing Trees
- A Novel
- By: Elif Shafak
- Narrated by: Daphne Kouma, Amira Ghazalla
- Length: 11 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Two teenagers, a Greek Cypriot and a Turkish Cypriot, meet at a taverna on the island they both call home. In the taverna, hidden beneath garlands of garlic, chili peppers and creeping honeysuckle, Kostas and Defne grow in their forbidden love for each other. A fig tree stretches through a cavity in the roof, and this tree bears witness to their hushed, happy meetings and eventually, to their silent, surreptitious departures. The tree is there when war breaks out, when the capital is reduced to ashes and rubble, and when the teenagers vanish.
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WOW! What a great story and narration!
- By Marcy on 12-02-21
By: Elif Shafak
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Honor
- By: Elif Shafak
- Narrated by: Mozhan Marno, Piter Marik
- Length: 12 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
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Performance
-
Story
An honor killing shatters and transforms the lives of Turkish immigrants in 1970s London. Internationally best-selling Turkish author Elif Shafak’s new novel is a dramatic tale of families, love, and misunderstandings that follows the destinies of twin sisters born in a Kurdish village. While Jamila stays to become a midwife, Pembe follows her Turkish husband, Adem, to London, where they hope to make new lives for themselves and their children. In London, they face a choice: stay loyal to the old traditions or try their best to fit in.
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Complex but Compelling
- By Cariola on 04-14-13
By: Elif Shafak
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The Hundred-Year Walk
- An Armenian Odyssey
- By: Dawn Anahid MacKeen
- Narrated by: Neil Shah, Emily Woo Zeller
- Length: 11 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
In the heart of the Ottoman Empire as World War I rages, Stepan Miskjian's world becomes undone. He is separated from his family as they are swept up in the government's mass deportation of Armenians into internment camps. Gradually realizing the unthinkable - that they are all being driven to their deaths - he fights, through starvation and thirst, not to lose hope.
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Everything a memoir should be. You will enjoy it!
- By Jakk on 02-19-18
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Birds Without Wings
- By: Louis de Bernieres
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 23 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Birds Without Wings is the story of a small town in Anatolia in the dying days of the Ottoman Empire told in the richly varied voices of the men and women (Armenians, Christians, and Muslims) whose lives are intertwined and rooted there: Iskander, the potter and local fount of wisdom; Philotei, the Christian girl of legendary beauty, courted almost from infancy by Ibrahim the goatherd, a great love that culminates in tragedy and madness; and many more.
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Not for the faint of heart
- By a on 01-03-05
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Istanbul
- Memories and the City
- By: Orhan Pamuk
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 9 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
A shimmering evocation, by turns intimate and panoramic, of one of the world’s great cities, by its foremost writer. Orhan Pamuk was born in Istanbul and still lives in the family apartment building where his mother first held him in her arms. His portrait of his city is thus also a self-portrait, refracted by memory and the melancholy—or hüzün—that all Istanbullus share.
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Terrible pronunciation
- By K. Jaynes on 02-25-18
By: Orhan Pamuk
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My Name Is Red
- By: Orhan Pamuk, Erdag Goknar - translator
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 20 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
At once a fiendishly devious mystery, a beguiling love story, and a brilliant symposium on the power of art, My Name Is Red is a transporting tale set amid the splendor and religious intrigue of 16th-century Istanbul, from one of the most prominent contemporary Turkish writers.
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Complex and interesting
- By Kathleen on 05-13-10
By: Orhan Pamuk, and others
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Last Train to Istanbul
- A Novel
- By: Ayşe Kulin John, John W. Baker - translator
- Narrated by: Sanjiv Jhaveri
- Length: 12 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Born into privilege to one of the last Ottoman pashas, beautiful, spirited Selva is the brightest jewel in her father’s household - until she falls in love with Rafael Alfandari. Though Turkey has long been a safe haven for Jews, marriage between a high-ranking Muslim girl and a Jewish boy is strictly forbidden. Yet young love will not be denied, and Selva and Rafael defy their parents and marry, fleeing to Paris in hopes of a better life - only to find themselves trapped in the path of the invading Nazis.
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Problematic Narration
- By Halit Pinar, MD on 01-02-15
By: Ayşe Kulin John, and others
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History of Armenia
- A Captivating Guide to Armenian History, Starting from Ancient Armenia to Its Declaration of Sovereignty from the Soviet Union
- By: Captivating History
- Narrated by: Jason Zenobia
- Length: 3 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
If you want to discover the captivating history of Armenia, then pay attention...The tale of Armenia has its beginnings as a glorious ancient kingdom, one that commanded the respect of nations as mighty as Egypt and Babylonia. For a long and ugly part of its history, Armenia struggled under the yokes of one empire after another. Yet through it all, Armenia, time and time again, emerged as a nation with a powerful identity, one that caused much grief over the years, but one that still remains a pillar of strength to its people in good times and in bad.
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Stunning tale of survival
- By Lucy on 04-04-23
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The Museum of Innocence
- By: Orhan Pamuk, Maureen Freely (translator)
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 20 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Kemal, scion of one of the city's wealthiest families, is about to become engaged to Sibel, daughter of another prominent family, when he encounters Füsun, a beautiful shopgirl and a distant relation. Once the long-lost cousins violate the code of virginity, a rift begins to open between Kemal and the world of the Westernized Istanbul bourgeosie - a world, as he lovingly describes it, with opulent parties and clubs, society gossip, picnics, and mansions on the Bosphorus, infused with the melancholy of decay.
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one of the very best I've ever heard
- By Rebecca Lindroos on 03-06-10
By: Orhan Pamuk, and others
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They Can Live in the Desert but Nowhere Else
- A History of the Armenian Genocide
- By: Ronald Grigor Suny
- Narrated by: Eric Jason Martin
- Length: 15 hrs and 34 mins