Read this when
The Idiot
For everyone who has decoded a text for an hour.
Who it's for
Anyone who has replayed every message from someone, trying to decode whether it meant something, will recognise Selin's mix of intensity and uncertainty.
Confused and overanalysing→Wry and self-aware
Feelings it meets
What it is
In 1995, Selin, the daughter of Turkish immigrants, starts her first year at Harvard. She befriends Svetlana, a worldly Serbian classmate, and begins an email correspondence with Ivan, an older Hungarian maths student.
Where to find it
In print from Penguin Random House (paperback, ebook, audiobook) and widely available in libraries.
Before you start
Age: Adult literary fiction; suggested 16+
You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope.Jane Austen, Persuasion, Chapter 23
