Reading notes for Man Booker International Prize shortlisted book A Strangeness in My Mind.
This is the story of boza seller Mevlut, the woman to whom he wrote three years’ worth of love letters, and their life in Istanbul. Between 1969 and 2012, Mevlut works a number of different jobs on the streets of Istanbul, from selling yoghurt and cooked rice to guarding a car park. He observes many different kinds of people thronging the streets, he witnesses all of the transformative moments in the city, and he always wonders what it is that separates him from everyone else – the source of that strangeness in his mind.
