Elif Shafak: The book that changed me

Available for over a year

The acclaimed Turkish author Elif Shafak, who has written bestselling novels such as The Forty Rules of Love, found reading recharged her creativity through lockdown. She shares why The Alexandria Quartet novels by British writer Lawrence Durrell renewed her connection with places and people when the world was retreating, and how they influenced her new novel, The Island of Missing Trees. (Photo: Elif Shafak. Credit: Ferhat Elik.)