A Knife to the Heart by Barbara Nadal

Forty years on, a wealthy but broken family must relive the dreadful events surrounding a young married woman’s alleged suicide. Although Cetin Ikmen has retired from the Istanbul police force, he is persuaded to investigate this not-so-cold case. A historian has discovered, in a ruined seaside villa, the Ouija board that predicted the bride, Deniz, would be the first of those present to die.  While Ikmen delves deeper and deeper into the circumstances surrounding her violent death, both past and present are obscured and illuminated by dynamics motivating the surviving relatives.

There is a mystical aspect to the personality of Cetin Ikmen, whose mother was a professional fortune teller and so-called witch. As he says, ‘Angels and demons….have always followed me about, one way or the other.’ He and some of his nine children have inherited an ability to see magical embodiments of strong emotion. Recently bereaved, they are convinced that a djinn has taken up residence in their kitchen. The djinn represents feelings that cannot be spoken, only shared. It is not necessary for the reader to believe in magical creatures, only to accept that they have significance for the Ikmens.

Nadel’s Istanbul springs into vibrant life on the page, as full of ancient beauty as it is of everyday corruption. Numan, an elderly British backpacker who never went home, says of the city, ‘Everyone knows everyone, but no-one knows anyone.’ The novel is set during Ramazan, and the wide disparity in how people observe this festival shows the diverse nature of the co-existing communities. It also provides an opportunity to read about some truly mouth-watering food.

This is the first of Barbara Nadel’s Turkish novels I have read. I will definitely be reading more of them in the future. Although it is one of a series, this story stands alone, so I quickly grasped the relationships between Ikmen, his former colleagues and his large family. I found the Turkish names slightly daunting, but there is a full cast list on the first page, and you can always tell who is involved in the action, from the context.

I recommend this book to anyone who enjoys a dark and twisty crime story, set in a complex, exciting location, with family values at its core. Be warned that those values may not be of the kind the reader initially expects.

A Knife to the Heart is published by Headline Publishing Group.