A beautifully rendered portrait of love, healing, and long-buried pain, digging deep into the nature of trauma and class division. Perfect for readers of Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman, The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy, and The Island of Missing Trees by Elif Shafak.
THE IDLE STANCE OF THE TIPPLER PIGEON
by Safinah Danish Elahi
Neem Tree Press, May 2023
(via Randle Editorial & Literary)
Zohaib, Misha and Nadia believed they would be in each other’s lives forever. As children they played, argued, teased and loved one another. Yet nothing could have prepared them for the tragic turn of events one fateful afternoon in Karachi, Pakistan, when the divisions and differences between them are revealed.
Years later and they are still trying to piece their lives back together, still trying to make sense of what happened. Zohaib is living in London, haunted by the ghosts of the past. Nadia has escaped the household where she first met Misha and Zohaib but finds fate delivering her back to their door…
Safinah Danish Elahi is a lawyer, writer and poet. She is the author of two books, The Unbridled Romance of Love and Pain and Eye on the Prize, a novel which is being adapted for tv. Safinah is also the founder of Reverie Publishers, an independent press based in Pakistan. Recently, she was selected for the Iowa Writing Program Fall Residency 2022.
Genderfluid Eamon Kastellakis wants to be beautiful. More than anything, he dreams of wearing couture dresses by the designers he worships, Alexander McQueen and Gucci, well away from the roar and threat of his alcoholic Greek da in their decaying house in Cork, Ireland.
Jonathan Abernathy is screwed. Jobless, behind on his student loan payments, and a self-declared failure, the only thing Abernathy has in abundance is debt. When a government loan forgiveness program offers him a job he can do literally in his sleep, he thinks he’s found his big break. That is, until he finds himself auditing the dreams of white collar workers, flagging their anxieties and preoccupations for removal.
Sixteen-year-old Odile Ozanne is an awkward, quiet girl, vying for a coveted seat on the Conseil. If she earns the position, she’ll decree who among the town’s residents may be escorted deep into the woods, who may cross the border’s barbed wire fence, who may make the arduous trek to descend into the next valley over. It’s the same valley, the same town. But to the east, the town is twenty years ahead in time. To the west, it’s twenty years behind. The only border crossings permitted by the Conseil are mourning tours: furtive viewings of the dead in towns where the dead are still alive.
As Jacob lies dying, he begins to write a letter to his only son, Isaac. They have not met or spoken in many years, and there are things that Isaac must know. Stories about his ancestral legacy in rural Arkansas that extend back to slavery. Secrets from Jacob’s tumultuous relationship with Isaac’s mother and the shame he carries from the dissolution of their family. Tragedies that informed Jacob’s role as a father and his reaction to Isaac’s being gay. But most of all, Jacob must share with Isaac the unspoken truths that reside in his heart. He must give voice to the trauma that Isaac has inherited. And he must create a space for the two to find peace.