Elif Shafak’s The Island of Missing Trees is a hauntingly beautiful novel that intertwines love, war, grief, and nature to explore how the past shapes and shadows the present. Told across two timelines, in 1970s Cyprus and 2000s London, the story follows Kostas, a Greek, and Defne, a Turkish, whose love defies time, distance ethnic divisions and political unrest. Their daughter, Ada, inherits not only their legacy but also the unspoken weight of a history that was never fully shared.

One of the most powerful elements of the book is how it handles memory – not as a clear, chronological account, but as a fragmented emotional experience.

Publication date : 2015
Author : Elif Shafak