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Reflections: The Island of Missing Trees by Ms. Elif Shafak
What was the book about? Ms. Elif is a believer of the inherited pain, and this book is about the same, in humans, in animals and in plants. The island of the missing trees is a historic fiction with the background set during 1974 Cyprus conflict. The protagonists of the story are Kostas, a Greek Christian, Defne, a Turkish Muslim and a Fig Tree (to be precise a female fig tree). The two teenagers with contrasting personalities fell in love, during the time they shouldn't. The book narrates their journey, through their perspectives and from the fig's point of view. How amid the communal tension and conflicts in Cyprus, the lovers had to part ways and how having lost their love they found themselves? How I felt after reading it? My very first thought was, how less I know about the past, the people and their pain. I had read about the holocaust, the nuclear attacks and as an Indian, about the communal riots happened during Indian Independence. I had not heard of Cyprus conflict