KURT SEYT & SHURA

Anyone who has spent time over the last couple of years haunting the historical drama selections on Netflix might have come across the beautiful Turkish offering, Kurt Seyt & Shura. What viewers might not realize is that the television series was based on a series of books by Turkish author Nermin Bezmen. Further, the casual viewer might not know that the books are a fictionalized account of the life of the real Kurt Seyt and the real Shura—and that the author is Kurt Seyt’s granddaughter!

Not having seen the series, I was unsure of what to expect when I began the book. What I found was an intricately researched and beautifully written tale of love and war, passion and betrayal, set in a world that is disintegrating, where commitment to land and lovers is sorely tried by the realities of obligation and the need to…