Want A Basic Lesson in Turkish Cuisine? Try Reading Mehmet Murat Somer's The Prophet Murders
Margy Rochlin Spinach borek from Sofra Kebab Express
In July, The Wall Street Journal published a lengthy piece on the publishing industry's quest for the next international thriller sensation à la Stieg Larsson, and among the authors cited was one of Turkey's best-selling writers of detective novels, Mehmet Murat Somer.
The unnamed narrator of Somer's stealthily political Hop-Çiki-Yaya series -- "Hop-Çiki-Yaya" being a Turkish cheerleading chant that's come to also be used to describe flamboyant gays -- is part-owner of a nightclub that caters to a transvestite clientele, but also an accomplished crime-solver who occasionally cross-dresses himself using Audrey Hepburn as his fashion role model. Like all good international crime fiction, Somer's prose doubles as a exotic travelogue -- in this case of present-day Istanbul -- but it also stands as a basic primer for Turkish cuisine.
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