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The Dervish House

3.84 of 5 stars 3.84 · rating details · 1,735 ratings · 298 reviews

ISTANBUL: QUEEN OF CITIES. Here histories, empires, and continents meet and cross. It is the mid-twenty first century and Turkey is a proud and powerful member of a European Union that runs from the Atlantic to Mt. Ararat.

In the sleepy Istanbul district of Eskiköy stands the former whirling dervish house of Adem Dede. Six characters' lives revolve around it.

A retired econo...more

Hardcover, 358 pages

Published July 27th 2010 by Pyr (first published February 1st 2009)

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Jul 15, 2010 Jacob rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2010, sci-fi-fantasy-etc

July 2010

Oh, my. That's a beautiful cover. I think I'll have to read this.

I know, I know, judging books by covers is a bad thing and I shouldn’t do it. This is why I haven’t read "...And Ladies of the Club", Helen Hooven Santmyer’s epic noviel about a reading group. Sure, it sounds like it might be interesting, but it also looks like a cheap romance novel, so no deal. I’ll wait a few years for the vampire/zombie/monster mash-up, hopefully titled "...And Ladies of the Stake." But Ian McDonald has...more

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Jul 23, 2010 Jason Pettus rated it 5 of 5 stars

(Reprinted from the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter.com:]. I am the original author of this essay, as well as the owner of CCLaP; it is not being reprinted illegally.)

(This is being published today for the first time in honor of "Ian McDonald Week" at CCLaP. For an overview of all the content regarding McDonald being posted here this week, you can click here.)

So what exactly are we talking about, anyway, when we talk about "cyberpunk," the subgenre in science-fiction t...more

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Jul 08, 2010 Stefan rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: science-fiction, www-fantasyliterature-com-review

Necdet, a troubled young man, is witness to what looks like a botched suicide bombing on a crowded city tram; afterwards, he starts seeing djinn and other supernatural creatures. Can, a nine year old boy with an amazing robotic toy — and a heart condition that confines him to a silent world — accidentally becomes involved in the intrigue. Ayse, a gallery owner, is contracted to find a mysterious and elusive relic, while her boyfriend Adnan, a successful trader, works on his own scheme to become...more Necdet, a troubled young man, is witness to what looks like a botched suicide bombing on a crowded city tram; afterwards, he starts seeing djinn and other supernatural creatures. Can, a nine year old boy with an amazing robotic toy — and a heart condition that confines him to a silent world — accidentally becomes involved in the intrigue. Ayse, a gallery owner, is contracted to find a mysterious and elusive relic, while her boyfriend Adnan, a successful trader, works on his own scheme to become rich. A retired Greek economist, Georgios, is recruited into a secret government think tank, and Leyla, a young social climber, tries to get involved with a promising nanotech startup.

These six narratives all take place in Istanbul, less than 20 years into the future. The city, historically a crossroads and now also the capital of the newest EU member nation, is where East meets West, old meets new, Christianity meets Islam, and Europe and Asia meet across the Bosphorus river that dissects the ancient city. Likewise, the lives of these six strangers will meet and interconnect in The Dervish House, a gorgeous new SF novel by Ian McDonald.

Just like in The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi, that other excellent near-future SF novel set in a capital city where ancient cultural traditions mix with a strong modern and western influence, the various point-of-view characters tell a complex, multi-faceted story, but they also create a vivid impression of life in a bustling, endlessly fascinating metropolis, seen from several equally effective angles. However, don’t draw the comparison between those two novels too far: The Dervish House isn’t without some darker moments, but it’s considerably less grim than The Windup Girl, and Ian McDonald is a much more experienced writer, resulting in a more accomplished novel. Readers who liked The Windup Girl will probably love The Dervish House, but the reverse isn’t necessarily true, even though they’re both excellent and memorable novels.

The Dervish House is initially a bit confusing, as the six separate narratives are each introduced in rapid succession, but Ian McDonald has enough talent to help you settle into the novel quickly. After a few sub-chapters, you’ll start recognizing characters, and even before that point, you can just enjoy the gorgeous prose and the loving look at Istanbul. Luckily, the author doesn’t overdo the exotic, evoking the city’s atmosphere with a few details here and there, letting much of it come across naturally as the story progresses. Leyla hectically trying to get across the city to a job interview, Georgios gossiping in a coffee house with his ancient Greek friends, Adnan and his colleagues obsessing over an upcoming soccer match: it’s hard not to feel as if you’ve actually visited Istanbul after reading The Dervish House.

Even though there are connections between the six narratives, especially towards the end of the novel, it may occasionally feel as if you’re reading six novellas that just happen to be set in the same city. Luckily, they’re six really, really good novellas. Even though you may like some of the story lines more than others, as often happens in novels with multiple p.o.v.’s, don’t skim over any of them, because you’ll find that they all have strong, multi-dimensional main characters and solid plot arcs. By the end, when the stories weave together towards the novel’s climax, I felt as I’d read the literary equivalent of Robert Altman’s Short Cuts, a movie that combines several Raymond Carver short stories into one big, impressive, bustling movie.

In the end, spending some time with these six characters in the fascinating city of Istanbul was pure enjoyment. Look for The Dervish House on the shortlists of the major SF&F awards next year. Highly recommended.

(This review was also published on the Fantasy Literature website: www.fantasyliterature.com - come check us out!)(less)

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Dec 18, 2011 smboro rated it 4 of 5 stars

I enjoyed this book very much, it reads the way great and unforgettable movies play. The chapters start like transitioning scenes and with enough details to keep the movie playing even if you haven't read the book for a couple of days. Also, the book wants you to commit before it starts (I think that's the Muslim way) with introducing the Turkish alphabet and then having people's names, food, places, and geography not-translated. The whole story is a fascinating near feature scenario. I hope thi...more

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Sep 02, 2012 Rafal Jasinski rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Ian McDonald wciąż oczarowuje rozmachem wizji niedalekiej przyszłości, oraz budzi respekt wielką dbałością o detale w jej przedstawieniu, na wielu różnych płaszczyznach. Bardzo łatwo poddać się temu, można powiedzieć wprost, wizjonerstwu, do tego stopnia, że czasem ciężko wyczuć granicę między tym, co w uniwersum McDonalda dzieje się / dziać się będzie w niedalekiej przyszłości, a tym, co jest już teraz - to płynne łączenie przyszłości z przeszłością i teraźniejszością dowodzi ogromnego kunsztu...more

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Mar 19, 2011 William rated it 5 of 5 stars

Having been very impressed with McDonald's previous two books, "River and Gods" and "Brasyl", I was looking forward to this and hoping that his portrayal of a futuristic Istanbul would match up with his portrayals of a futuristic India and Brazil from the preceding books. One of the best features of the book is his evocative description of a mid-21st Century Istanbul, having never been to Turkey I can't tell how genuine his portrayal of a future Turkey is, but he certainly makes it feel authenti...more

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Dec 04, 2011 Ryan rated it 3 of 5 stars

One of my favorite moments in The Dervish House is when Ian McDonald outlines an unusual think tank that is intended to anticipate terrorism. This think tank will be given a minimal amount of data and will then be asked to make intuitive predictions.

The backgrounds of the members included are quite interesting. One of the participants is a "pscyhogeographer," or a person that traces the history of a city's geography and its impact on people's lives. Why do people on one side of a street consiste...more One of my favorite moments in The Dervish House is when Ian McDonald outlines an unusual think tank that is intended to anticipate terrorism. This think tank will be given a minimal amount of data and will then be asked to make intuitive predictions.

The backgrounds of the members included are quite interesting. One of the participants is a "pscyhogeographer," or a person that traces the history of a city's geography and its impact on people's lives. Why do people on one side of a street consistently earn more than their neighbors? Another is an "experimental economist" who has created a terror market. A science fiction writer is also included, which for me raises the question: why would a science fiction writer be included in such a think tank?

At some point, our science fiction writers stopped dreaming about the future and started worrying about it, often in surprisingly repetitive and predictable ways. Isn't every technological advance ushering in some variation of the totalitarian state or the post-apocalyptic wasteland? It makes sense, I suppose. When we look at our technological advances, it's difficult to escape the feeling that our advances are indeed harming the planet and are often restricting our liberties. So the role of the science fiction writer seems to have changed from anticipating the future to dreading it.

We might think that a science fiction writer with a perspective like Thomas Pynchon would be useful in a think tank like the one McDonald outlines, but I'm not so sure. If we only dread the future, I can't help thinking that we are limiting our ability to think intuitively.

Thankfully, McDonald offers a somewhat old-fashioned take on the future. The technology that he describes in The Dervish House is related to advances in "nano." McDonald's not naive about this technology, and he points out how it can be used for ends almost as nefarious as the Death Star. However, McDonald also takes the time to portray the wonder of the future in a way that recalled for me science fiction films from the 1970s -- a future in which the furniture and body armor was made of white plastic (but not in an ironic way). And that's something I'd like to see more of in my science fiction.

Well, maybe not the white plastic.(less)

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May 14, 2013 Ben rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: a-rated, a-owned, a-flagged, fiction-science

Dervish House reads like an anthropology paper from the near future, but written entirely in prose. This is not to say that the writing is not enjoyable: to the contrary, the construction of the individual sentences is probably the high point of the novel. There's a slightly interesting plot that frames the story, but it shows itself only sporadically, and mostly at the beginning and end. Rather, the novel is a showcase for the research that McDonald has done on Istanbul and various religious se...more

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Apr 24, 2013 Piet Boels rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Read it quickly, read it now. Ian Mcdonalds urban fiction noir story of Istanbul somewhere in the 2030's may not age that well. Although it is a very clever story mixing some hardboiled, detailed story-telling á la Patterson (RN, not J), with some Hardy Boys pastiche and with some real science fiction, the references are a bit too detailed to last very long. "Nano" is used as a catch-all for technological and pharmacological (read mind-altering) developments and as such it is very similar to "at...more

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Mar 09, 2013 Ricki Treleaven rated it 5 of 5 stars

Ian McDonald, author of The Dervish House, is a genius. Let me preface this review by saying that I am not a science fiction reader; but I absolutely loved this book. I will defininitely read more of McDonald's books in 2011.

The setting of The Dervish House is Istanbul, Turkey, shortly after Turkey's acceptance into the European Union (seventeen years or so from now). I wish there were an illustrated edition of the book because I kept taking breaks and googling various locations in the city. The...more

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Feb 09, 2013 Joel rated it 5 of 5 stars

Ian McDonald has written several near-future science fiction novels which take place, not in the usual places (America, Europe), but in countries such as Brazil, India, and (in this case) Turkey. It's good to be reminded that the future belongs to everyone.

I had previously read one other of McDonald's books, Brasyl; and, while the Brazilian setting was interesting enough, I felt that the plot was unremarkable. This book is a big improvement in that regard. It follows six characters, each of whom...more Ian McDonald has written several near-future science fiction novels which take place, not in the usual places (America, Europe), but in countries such as Brazil, India, and (in this case) Turkey. It's good to be reminded that the future belongs to everyone.

I had previously read one other of McDonald's books, Brasyl; and, while the Brazilian setting was interesting enough, I felt that the plot was unremarkable. This book is a big improvement in that regard. It follows six characters, each of whom have some connection to the centuries-old titular Istanbul building, a former sanctuary for dervishes; now converted into apartments and an art gallery. There's Leyla, a young marketing graduate, who is offered the opportunity to help a distant relative get his nanotech company off the ground. Adnan, a high-flying commodities trader, has a secret deal in the works which will make him and his three friends millionaires; and which happens to be highly illegal. Adnan's wife Ayse, who owns an art gallery specializing in religious art, has been offered a lot of money to track down a legendary and possibly mythical item. A stoner and slacker named Necdet has been caught in a terrorist tram bombing; although he survived, he has begun to see disturbing visions. A nine-year-old boy named Can, whose heart condition compels his parents to keep him mostly isolated from the world and free from stress, begins to investigate something he's witnessed, and soon comes to believe he's on the trail of a terrorist plot. Which interests his neighbor and confidante Georgios, an old Greek economist and member of a government think tank; who, however, is distracted by the return to Istanbul of a long-lost love.

The plot jumps between all 6 of these characters, generally spending only a few pages on each one before jumping again. This is often frustrating, because each person's story is interesting enough that you don't want to leave it. But that's why this sort of narrative structure is so effective; done well, it goes a long way towards heightening tension and suspense. And this is especially true when the various stories begin to intersect and affect one another.

At the human scale, the characters are interesting and well-drawn and the plot is pleasingly intricate. But there's no shortage of Big Ideas here, either. The overarching theme is nanotechnology. McDonald posits that nanotech is the next big industrial revolution, which will have at least as large an impact on humanity (in ways that are probably impossible to fully predict) as the information-technology advances of the past couple decades. And he doesn't flinch from the probability that not all of its applications will be benign.

Overall: one of the best science-fiction books I've read in years.(less)

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Dec 18, 2012 Nese Tuncer rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The Dervish House was suggested to me by my brother and although being a little sceptical on his literary taste, I bought the book. I didn't know what to expect as this was the first time I was reading a book by Ian McDonald. From the first pages on, I was hooked to the story although the plot and character developments were slow. I live in Istanbul and McDonald described the city, the sights, the smells, the people...the language of the book is beautiful, Turkish is not only in the names of the...more

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Oct 29, 2012 Diane rated it 4 of 5 stars

Set in Istanbul in the mid-21st century, this book tells the story of six different characters as their lives intersect during one week of an Istanbul heat wave. The novel is science fiction, so it features a lot of new inventions, such as nano-technology. However, the overall world in which it is set is rather like our own.

The author does a good job of connecting the past with the present, and making the case that much of the new technology is similar to old ideas about human nature. In fact, m...more

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Oct 20, 2012 Klytia rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The Dervish House è un romanzo piuttosto complesso ambientato nell’arco di una settimana, con 6 abitanti della casa del Deviscio ciascuno protagonista di una storia. Inutile dire che McDonald non solo riesce a gestire ciascuna vicenda in modo superbo ma non manca anche di approfondire tanto i protagonisti quanto alcuni comprimari e non ultimo restituire le atmosfere della città di Istanbul.
A parte le trame puramente fantascientifiche, prima tra tutte le nanotecnologie che possono mutare la perso...more The Dervish House è un romanzo piuttosto complesso ambientato nell’arco di una settimana, con 6 abitanti della casa del Deviscio ciascuno protagonista di una storia. Inutile dire che McDonald non solo riesce a gestire ciascuna vicenda in modo superbo ma non manca anche di approfondire tanto i protagonisti quanto alcuni comprimari e non ultimo restituire le atmosfere della città di Istanbul.
A parte le trame puramente fantascientifiche, prima tra tutte le nanotecnologie che possono mutare la personalità delle persone, farle diventare fanatici religiosi o esperti in qualunque campo, la storia che mi ha più affascinata è quella che vede protagonista Ayse, proprietaria di un negozio d’antiquariato, alla ricerca del Mellified Man o Uomo Mellificato.
McDonald dedica alcune pagine a questa leggenda di origini arabe. Un anziano alla fine dei suoi giorni decide di nutrirsi esclusivamente di miele finchè la sua pelle e i suoi umori assumono un colore dorato ed un profumo dolce. Alla sua morte l’uomo viene immerso in una bara riempita di miele e quindi lasciato riposare per almeno un centinaio d'anni trascorsi i quali i resti dell’uomo vengono trasferiti in vasi più piccoli. La leggenda vuole che il miele e i resti dell’uomo siano una cura per tutti i malanni.
Per seguire le tracce dell’Uomo Mellificato Ayse percorre le strade della Istanbul più mistica, seguendo una mappa della città nella quale sono nascoste le lettere che compongono i nomi di Dio.
This is the secret name of God, written across Istanbul in letters too great and yet too small to be comprehended. This is the stir of djinn and rememberings, which are not as different as humans think, in the twilight of Adem Dede Square, outside the old dervish house. This is the turn, this is the whirl, this is the dance that is woven into every particle of the universe. This is the laughter of Hizir the Green Saint. This is Istanbul, Queen of Cities, and she will endure as long as human hearts beat upon the earth.(less)

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Jul 28, 2012 Nick rated it 5 of 5 stars

http://idearefinery.blogspot.com.au/2011/06/hugos-2011-dervish-house-by-ian.html

Only twice in my life have I had any desire to visit Istanbul. The first time was during a Roman history course at University. The second time was just now, as I finished The Dervish House.

The Dervish House is about lots and lots of things. It's about economics, terrorism, religion, nano-technology, Istanbul, revolution, migrant communities, and history. It's about patterns, and choices. And most importantly, it's ab...more http://idearefinery.blogspot.com.au/2011/06/hugos-2011-dervish-house-by-ian.html

Only twice in my life have I had any desire to visit Istanbul. The first time was during a Roman history course at University. The second time was just now, as I finished The Dervish House.

The Dervish House is about lots and lots of things. It's about economics, terrorism, religion, nano-technology, Istanbul, revolution, migrant communities, and history. It's about patterns, and choices. And most importantly, it's about a boy imprisoned by his heart condition, an ambitious young commodities trader, a Greek economics professor long since driven from academia, the owner of a gallery of religious artefacts and curios, a lost and broken young man, and a young woman trying to both escape from, and prove herself to, her family.

Reading this book felt like learning. The good kind of learning, where you're exposed to interesting ideas and places, and pleasantly surprising little stories. The book is full of remembrances and flashbacks, which serve both to drive the plot forward and illuminate the characters. Each one feels like a lovely little story-package, enjoyable both for its role in the novel and as a fragment itself. The re-telling of the creation of the Mellified Man of Iskenderun, for example, is a piece of writing that will stay with me for a very long time. Just thinking about it makes me smile.

I think it is fair to say that this is a book that requires some work from the reader, and that may not be to everyone's taste. There's a lot of ideas to keep straight here. I said before that I think McDonald's writing is very information-dense, and The Dervish House is no different. It's important to add, though, that the book is about how the characters interact with those ideas -- this certainly is not the type of science fiction where ideas are more important than people.

If I had one criticism, it's that the ending felt a little too inevitable. Perhaps it was telegraphed a bit early. I didn't really have that wonderful moment, like in Connie Willis' To Say Nothing of the Dog, when all the plot threads coalesced into a suddenly brilliant whole. But it's really a minor criticism -- once I got into it, I just wanted to keep reading and reading. It may not all have fit in my head, but I would have read this book in a weekend if I could.

The Dervish House is my vote for the 2011 Best Novel Hugo, absolutely. When I travel, I love to stay in a place long enough to get a feel for what it's like to live there. The Dervish House felt not only like travelling to Istanbul in 2027, but to the lives of six people quite unlike me. It made me feel smart, and engaged, and it made me happy.(less)

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Jul 13, 2012 Dawn Marie rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: scifi

Although a geek girl at heart, I’ve never really read a great deal of Science Fiction. Some Bradbury, a dash of Heinlein, a little Gibson, fair bit of LeGuin, but not enough. Of what I read of Bradbury, I loved Dandelion Wine the best – a glass of nostalgic strawberry lemonade – sweet as childhood memory, with a metallic tang of old-school horror. Heinlein seemed to really, really like porn (and his mom, apparently?), and I can respect that, but I can’t say I enjoyed his work. Gibson caught my e...more Although a geek girl at heart, I’ve never really read a great deal of Science Fiction. Some Bradbury, a dash of Heinlein, a little Gibson, fair bit of LeGuin, but not enough. Of what I read of Bradbury, I loved Dandelion Wine the best – a glass of nostalgic strawberry lemonade – sweet as childhood memory, with a metallic tang of old-school horror. Heinlein seemed to really, really like porn (and his mom, apparently?), and I can respect that, but I can’t say I enjoyed his work. Gibson caught my emo-imagination, but while he could spin a setting and a time that felt as real as silicon grit in your palms, his characters were holograms. Ian McDonald, who I’d never heard of until this year’s NorWesCon, balances strong characters with a future that feels only a breath away in his Hugo-nominated, Arthur C. Clark Award-nominated, British Science Fiction Association Award-winning book The Dervish House.

Like LeGuin, McDonald introduces you to people that he’s genuinely fond of: the farm girl looking to make good in the high-end world of marketing, the little boy cut off from the world by illness, whose elderly Radical Economist neighbor helps reach out to the world by modifying the boy’s pet robot, the decidedly secular antiques dealer who collects sacred art, the slick stockbroker who rides the highs of the market with a tube of concentration-enhancing nano powder in his pocket, and even the probably sociopathic Necdet, who has been subject to terrible visions since a terrorist attack during his morning commute.

This book is written by a white guy, by the way. A European. This is likely a failing on my part, but I can’t remember the last time I read a book where no one was American, or where at least 80% of the characters weren’t Caucasian (it was probably Achebe’s Things Fall Apart). And hey, it’s set in a world where the people of color aren’t interstellar Aliens! (I’m looking at you, various Stargates!)

Dervish House has glorious art, relic hunting, insider trading, kidnapping, a history of political unrest and a sheen of futuristic and unlikely optimism wrapping it all together. There’s riveting action and engaging science: McDonald untangles complex ideas in ways that make you feel 20 IQ points smarter than you were when you started the book. Whether it’s magic, nano-science or only superb craft, this book is worthy of your time.

(less)

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Jun 20, 2012 Jacqie rated it 4 of 5 stars

I'm still not sure what to say about this book, but I guess I'm going to say it anyway.

This was not an easy book to read. I found myself reading at about half my normal reading pace. I don't think the plot was so difficult to follow, I think that I was trying to pronounce things in Turkish in my head the whole book, which slowed me down. The book felt quite fragmented at the beginning, since we've got half a dozen POV characters and we're not sure what the information we're getting from one pers...more

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Apr 12, 2012 John rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction

The Dervish House is set in Istanbul during a single working week in April 2027 as the city swelters under another heatwave. The small but diverse cast of main characters are linked by their various associations with the Dervish House itself – the place they live or work, whether legally or not. That rambling and almost semi-magical survival from the Ottoman Empire is the story’s unquiet still centre where minorities and faiths marooned by history still hold on, and past traumas and regrets pers...more

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Oct 08, 2011 Kathryn rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: science-fiction

I couldn’t even finish The Dervish House. I got about 40 pages in (a full ten percent) and dropped it. A ton of characters were introduced, but not a single one succeeded in getting my attention or sympathy. I liked the setting (Istanbul), but got very, very tired of the would-be poetic description. The author went on for pages – in flowery present tense – about everything. Fireworks took ten pages to go off, and internal monologues lasted for three or four pages in the middle of dialogue. All i...more

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Aug 11, 2011 Jessica Strider rated it 5 of 5 stars

Pros: lyrical writing, intricate and complex plot, exotic setting, Can's bitbots are cool

Cons: have to pay close attention (sudden flashbacks/memories, lots of minute details), minor character & place names are unusual and similar enough that they're easily confused when jumping between so many storylines (Ogun Saltuk, Selma Ozgun, Oguz, Ozer)

The novel is set in the Istanbul of 2027. Turkey is part of the EU. Nanotech is used to give people a mental edge, especially in businesses like tradin...more

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Aug 01, 2011 Erin Lale rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: science-fiction

I received an electronic copy of this book in my Hugo voter packet. So I was reading it with an eye to seeing if it deserved an award, and I was holding it to a high standard. That may be why I was so disappointed.

This book has some really good ideas: original, sf'nal, even hard. Unfortunately, the reader has to plow through 250 pages of lead-up to get to them. Up until that point, this could have been written as a mainstream novel, and the sf elements could have been eliminated in under a minu...more I received an electronic copy of this book in my Hugo voter packet. So I was reading it with an eye to seeing if it deserved an award, and I was holding it to a high standard. That may be why I was so disappointed.

This book has some really good ideas: original, sf'nal, even hard. Unfortunately, the reader has to plow through 250 pages of lead-up to get to them. Up until that point, this could have been written as a mainstream novel, and the sf elements could have been eliminated in under a minute by using find-and-replace to replace "ceptep" with "iPhone" and "nano" with "pills." By the time I got to the part where the "djinn" are explained, I was invested in the idea of djinn, so it was vaguely disappointing to find out what they really were, whereas it would have been cool and fun if I had been let in on the big secret soon enough to switch my emotions to "oh cool, an sf techy idea" rather than "now you tell me!" and "is this thing over yet?"

There is quite a lot of local color, in the form of descriptions of Istanbul, its occupants, history, legends, and physical culture, so if you're in love with Turkey, you might like this book even if you're not an sf fan, if you can stand the constant jumping around from one "main" character to another. I'm not against multi viewpoint, eye-of-god perspective; I've even written books that way myself. But this just isn't done very well. I didn't know what all the various plots and people have to do with each other until the very end, and by that point I just wanted to find out what happened and turn the computer off.

If I had received this book in my slush pile-- I'm the publisher and editor of Time Yarns, a transmedia micropress-- I would have told the author to cut it way down, find a viewpoint and stick to it, make the hard-sf angle of the plot come into the story well before the past-the-middle point, stop pausing the action for multi-page-length descriptions of objects that have no bearing on the plot, and if you're going to do a multi-viewpoint story, at the very least stick to either third or second person when you write about a specific character, and don't switch at the end.

Erin Lale
Publisher and Editor of Time Yarns(less)

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Jun 05, 2011 Carson Kicklighter rated it 4 of 5 stars

Hugo-nominee The Dervish House is captivating because of its authentic, copious, engaging details. It’s satisfying and thought-provoking because it interweaves themes and motifs into a steadily moving plot.

I’ve never read a near-future sci-fi book set in Instanbul, so I was fascinated by the cultural mix of Greeks, Turks, and Eastern Europeans. Home, food, politics, lifestyle: Ian McDonald paints them all with vivid, specific details. Unfortunately, these details often slow down the book and mak...more

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May 28, 2011 Alexandra rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: read-in-2011

I have long been enamoured of Turkey. Actually, strictly speaking I have long been enamoured of the idea of Turkey: the decadence, the luxury, the it’s very different there. Over the last number of years I have come to the realisation that this idea, or dream, of the country is a very European one, and a very colonial one in many regards – it’s a view of “the East” that has existed in “the West” at least since the Romans had their snooty ideas about Egypt and Persia. Despite being well aware of...more I have long been enamoured of Turkey. Actually, strictly speaking I have long been enamoured of the idea of Turkey: the decadence, the luxury, the it’s very different there. Over the last number of years I have come to the realisation that this idea, or dream, of the country is a very European one, and a very colonial one in many regards – it’s a view of “the East” that has existed in “the West” at least since the Romans had their snooty ideas about Egypt and Persia. Despite being well aware of its source, and feeling uncomfortable about that, there is still an allure in those incredibly not-politically-correct views. And that’s the point, of course: the allure comes from the (alleged) exotic nature of somewhere very ‘different’ (from Western Europe), and difference is always attractive. (The point, too, was that by identifying certain things like decadence as traits from over there, the viewer could take the prim moral stance and still enjoy it. But I digress….)

I got to thinking about these sorts of things in reading The Dervish House because it is set in near-future Istanbul: a city in many ways very similar to those of Western Europe, America, and Australia that I am familiar with, but with enough differences – real differences – that it retains an aura of the exotic. The story could, with some changes of course, be set in any city really. But setting it in Istanbul allows McDonald to do many things, not least of which is imbuing his setting with a deep sense of history that the relatively new cities of America and Australia just don’t have. Istanbul is very much a character in this novel; the complexity of the city itself – geographically, historically – is deeply important to the plot and the characters. There is even a character whose main interest in life is mapping the social history of the city, an idea I find very attractive.

The Dervish House is a simultaneously dense and frantic novel. In 472 pages McDonald covers five days in the life of the city, from the point of view of six main characters. An old Greek man, a young Turkish invalid, a successful businesswoman, an ambitious businesswoman, a no-hoper and a stockmarket player: with this cast, McDonald creates a vibrant city. Some of their stories interweave with one another, at one point or another, while others appear tangential; all combine to give a rich, rich view of the near future. Their plots are wonderfully varied: there’s romance, there’s adventure, there’s corporate espionage and shady deals and antiquarian detective work; religious fanaticism, world-weariness, wild success and disappointments. At times the writing is so dense that I had a little trouble following it, but the sheer beauty of it – along with the compelling sense that I needed to know what was going to happen – meant that wasn’t too much of a hassle.

One of the things that fascinated me about this book is that reading it as an SF reader, it’s clearly SF; there are enough references to nanotechnology and other futuristic things to ensure that. However, the date isn’t made clear until about two-thirds of the way through the book, and the technology isn’t really central, so it ought to have broader mainstream appeal, too.(less)

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Jan 28, 2011 Clay rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: sf-fantasy

Maybe it just seems that way, but I have to think there were more books like Ian McDonald’s excellent “The Dervish House” (Pyr, $26, 358 pages) back in the day.

“The Dervish House,” set in Istanbul in the near future, combines science (and comprehensible science, no less), fiction (fleshed-out, flawed but sympathetic characters) and a complex, satisfying plot that keeps the pages turning. We’ve got terrorists, high-level business deals, an intriguing future, romance, a Boy Detective, all handled...more

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Dec 20, 2010 Alan rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Lovers of complexity

Recommended to Alan by: Previous work; res ipsa loquitur

The Dervish House gives the impression that it could easily be as messy, sprawling and complex as Istanbul itself. It can't, of course; no single work of fiction could approach the complexity of even the most modern and mundane of cities, much less the ancient metropolis that stands at the crossroads between Asia and Europe. But after a leisurely start, The Dervish House ended up being amazing anyway.

Complex and multithreaded, this novel defies easy synopsis. Its plot is a mix of ancient and mod...more The Dervish House gives the impression that it could easily be as messy, sprawling and complex as Istanbul itself. It can't, of course; no single work of fiction could approach the complexity of even the most modern and mundane of cities, much less the ancient metropolis that stands at the crossroads between Asia and Europe. But after a leisurely start, The Dervish House ended up being amazing anyway.

Complex and multithreaded, this novel defies easy synopsis. Its plot is a mix of ancient and modern, as futuristic as nanotechnology, multiform robots and other marvels can make it, yet as immediate as suicide bombers and global warming.

Istanbul is in the midst of a protracted heat wave when Necdet Hasgüler witnesses firsthand a woman on a tram touch a jewel at her throat and explode. He lives to tell about it, though he has no interest in repeating his story, especially to the police. Necdet's presence in the ancient wooden Adem Dede dervish house in the Eskiköy neighborhood is not strictly legal, you see, and official questions would be bad both for him and for his brother Ismet, an aspiring shaykh whose tarikat (order or congregation) would like to dispense an updated and more flexible version of "street shariat," the rule and interpretation of Islamic law. Yet despite his efforts, Necdet has been observed...

Georgios Ferentinou, an elderly disgraced economist, also lives in the Dervish House. When he's not at Bülent's teahouse across the way commiserating with his fellow expatriate Greeks, he has befriended 9-year-old Can Durukan, a boy who lives in the Dervish House with his parents and who suffers from a sensitivity to loud noises that could kill him if he doesn't always wear his noise-canceling earplugs. Can experiences the world at one remove even when he's physically present; his greatest pleasure, therefore, is to send out his robot toy, a souped-up drone that can change among the shapes of Rat, Snake and Bird...

Leyla Gültaşli moved to Istanbul from the farming town of Demre. She's a marketing graduate who is only living in the Dervish House until she can find a job...

Ayşe Erkoç owns a gallery on Adem Dede square and sells antiquities to the discerning collector; Ayşe's husband Adnan Sarioğlu is a trader whose skills at arbitrage have put him on the verge of a multimillion-Euro deal...

All of these characters and more inhabit a complex narrative that keeps on spiraling up and up to an utterly satisfying denouement. Along the way, McDonald finds the time to touch on issues as varied as Turkish integration into the European Union; the pitfalls of AI-assisted commodities trading; nanotechnological worries that don't involve "grey goo"; and a scientific disquisition on the intelligence of crows that I know for a fact is accurate, because I recently saw the awesome PBS special about that same subject.

What I'm saying is that here is a rich and compelling novel that rewards careful reading with an exciting and plausible science fiction story. I think it would make a good companion piece to Greg Egan's Zendegi, which I also recently read and reviewed... both are set in similar times and parts of the world, and although they ended up leaving very different impressions on me, they both managed to impress.(less)

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Aug 28, 2010 Marcus Gipps rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I’ve sat down and tried to write about this book at least twice now, and both times have ended up being distracted, which of course has left me terribly behind on this whole blogging thing. Given that, I’m going to do a fairly brief version three, with apologies – I had a lot of things to say about The Dervish House, and it is a book that repays attentive reading, but quite frankly I need to get on with everything else, so there you go. Having said that, I’ll probably end up blathering on for ag...more I’ve sat down and tried to write about this book at least twice now, and both times have ended up being distracted, which of course has left me terribly behind on this whole blogging thing. Given that, I’m going to do a fairly brief version three, with apologies – I had a lot of things to say about The Dervish House, and it is a book that repays attentive reading, but quite frankly I need to get on with everything else, so there you go. Having said that, I’ll probably end up blathering on for ages…

Nominally a science-fiction book, and largely being published as such, this is one of those SF books that I would recommend to readers of modern literary fiction. It probably wouldn’t sell as many copies – I’m sure Gollancz know what they are doing – but this is seriously good stuff. It was, apparently, called in by the Booker judges (although it didn’t make it to the longlist, clearly), which should be some indication of the quality of the work.

Set in Istanbul of the near future, and deeply recognisable in terms of technology and politics, the breadth of the range of characters is outstanding. It may take a little while to get your head around the various protagonists – and longer to work out how their stories are all going to tie together – but the novel powers on with such confidence and gusto that you’ll have no problem sticking with it. McDonald defines his subjects clearly and easily (although that isn’t to say that they’re one-dimensional, by any means), and he slowly paints in the city in which they live in utterly believable terms. Futuristic but with a deep sense of history, cynical but touched with real humanity, there can be no doubt that the author has researched this book to within an inch of its life, but wears his knowledge lightly.

I could go on for hours about the apparent complexity but beautiful simplicity of the plot, and talk your ears off about some of the novel’s most successful set pieces, or bore you to tears about the way you’ll feel for the characters, even those who are self-serving, unpleasant or cruel. But that would take ages, and as I said I’m going to move on with the other books I’ve read. None of them have been as good as this one. If you like a bit of intelligent SF, read it. Actually, if you like intelligent fiction full stop, read it. It really is that good.

I read a proof on holiday in June, but the book is out now, ISBN: 9780575080522 (less)

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Nov 24, 2010 Ahimsa rated it 5 of 5 stars

This is a fantasic book; the best of 2010 that I have read. The prose is simultaneously easy-to-read and also weighty (never seeming ponderous.) Stylistically, it reminded me of Meiville. There are a handful of characters and it is their diversity that forms one of the strongest bases of the novel. The narrative builds up but always is fast-paced.

I do have a few quibbles. The present tense is a little hard to deal with, and the multiple shifting of POV's makes it dificult initially to engage wit...more

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Aug 27, 2011 Erik rated it 3 of 5 stars

Very well written and researched, but the pace is slow and meandering. A bit of a slog actually. The science fiction takes a back seat to the writer's desire to build up setting and atmosphere with literary techniques. The setting is, of course, Istanbul, one of the most interesting cities in the world. We see it twenty years hence, as nanotechnology has superseded the information revolution (nano you can snort!). We are following six or so characters over six days after a bomb blast on the tram...more

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Aug 25, 2011 James rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: io9-book-club, science-fiction, 5-stars, i-own-a-copy, read-in-2011, read-in-teenties, ebook, reviewed

I nearly didn't read this book. The sample failed to interest me. In fact it seemed so over-written and dense that I wasn't sure what the book was about after the better part of the first chapter. However, in-part because the book was Hugo nominated and in-part because it was the io9.com book club read for the month I persevered and bought the book.

Rereading the first chapter made a lot more sense the second time around, and almost the very next page after the sample had ended the book came aliv...more

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Oct 11, 2010 Bookmarks Magazine rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: nov-dec-2010

Known for his sweeping outlook, elaborately envisioned futures, and blend of science and mysticism, Ian McDonald has written a fascinating, thought-provoking novel worthy of his reputation. He paints a vivid portrait of the ancient city of Istanbul, layering it with political, cultural, and religious strata, as well as an ingeniously imagined world of practical nanotechnology. Critics praised his compelling characters--all too often a casualty of genre fiction--and his poetic prose, but they als...more

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About Ian McDonald

Ian Neil McDonald (1960-) is a British science fiction novelist, living in Belfast. His themes include nanotechnology, postcyberpunk settings, and the impact of rapid social and technological change on non-Western societies.

McDonald was born in 1960, in Manchester, to a Scottish father and Irish mother, but moved to Belfast when he was five, and has lived there ever since. He therefore lived throu...more

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“He's never fought with religion; what is the point of railing against such beauty, such intimate theatre, such chime of eternity? He can treasure it without believing in it.” — 5 people liked it

“Mr. Durukan, if God is dead then everything is conspiracy.” — 4 people liked it

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