"Blazing with a family’s impulse to survive and rise from the ashes of destruction, this remarkable Greece-set novel is intimate, epic, and exhilaratingly absorbing."
If you loved Christy Lefteri’s The Beekeeper of Aleppo, The Book of Fire will surely also have you in its thrall. Beautifully-written, it sees a family forced to redefine and rebuild a sense of home and hope in the wake of a cataclysmic fire.
The story opens with an assertion of the importance of community (the ancient Greek polis), and mention of an outsider who wasn’t much-liked in the village even before he started a catastrophic fire. Then we meet musician Irini, her husband Tasso, who paints the surrounding ancient forest, and their daughter Chara.
So far, so blissful, until a wild fire engulfs the forest and village, forcing families to flee, resulting in devastating loss and deep scarring. When Irini discovers the body of the man who started the fire, she makes a decision that will haunt her through the years, while her husband is haunted by the loss of his father.
I was utterly swept up by the story, the rich language, the drama, and the dynamics of an unforgettable Greek family who have much to mourn, much to recover from, and, as things turn out, many reasons to love and renew themselves. Then there’s the contextual themes of greed, humankind’s destructive impulses, the bonds that bind us, kindness and love, here conveyed in compelling style.
| Primary Genre | General Fiction |
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