Midnight at the Pera Palace
- Author Charles King
- Narrator Grover Gardner
- Publisher Blackstone Publishing
- Publish Date 15 September 2014
- Run Time 12 hours and 12 minutes
- Format Audio
- Genre History, Middle Eastern history.
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What to expect
At midnight, December 31, 1925, citizens of the newly proclaimed Turkish Republic celebrated the New Year. For the first time ever, they had agreed to use a nationally unified calendar and clock.
Yet in Istanbul—an ancient crossroads and Turkey's largest city—people were looking toward an uncertain future. Never purely Turkish, Istanbul was home to generations of Greeks, Armenians, and Jews, as well as Muslims. It welcomed White Russian nobles ousted by the Russian Revolution, Bolshevik assassins on the trail of the exiled Leon Trotsky, German professors, British diplomats, and American entrepreneurs—a multicultural panoply of performers and poets, do-gooders and ne'er-do-wells.
During the Second World War, thousands of Jews fleeing occupied Europe found passage through Istanbul, some with the help of the future Pope John XXIII. At the Pera Palace, Istanbul's most luxurious hotel, so many spies mingled in the lobby that the manager posted a sign asking them to relinquish their seats to paying guests.
With beguiling prose and rich character portraits, Charles King brings to life a remarkable era when a storied city stumbled into the modern world and reshaped the meaning of cosmopolitanism.
Critics Review
“Grover Gardner’s deep, versatile voice…[and] skill in delivering terms in several languages, along with his other strengths, makes this a production well worth listening to.”
“The ornately decaying hotel crouched at the center of a mare’s nest of intrigue, violence, sex, and espionage, all set against the slow dimming of Ottoman magnificence. I loved this book.”
“Popular history at its best.”
“A hugely enjoyable, magnificently researched, and deeply absorbing book.”
“Multiple biographies unfold against the backdrop of an old city’s growing pains.”
“An engaging, detailed look at the old city that became the newest of them
all.”
“Fascinating and perceptive.”
“Highly recommended for anyone interested in war or religious history.”
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