Beekeeper of Aleppo (Lefteri) - Book Reviews

Book Reviews
In recounting the daily brutality as well as the glimmers of beauty, this novel humanizes the terrifying refugee stories we read about in the news. Lefteri explores questions of trust and portrays what trauma and loss can do to individuals and their relationships.… A beautiful rumination on seeing what is right in front of us—both the negative and the positive.
Boston Globe


Beekeeper Nuri and his wife, Afra, are devastated by the Syrian civil war. After violence claims their child and Afra’s eyesight, the couple is forced to flee Aleppo and make the fraught journey to Britain—and an uncertain future ("5 Books Not to Miss").
USA Today


[Christy] Lefteri sensitively charts what it’s like when war comes home, alert to the subtle effects of trauma and grief. Nuri and Afra are not broadly sketched as victims, but rather suffer in different and complex ways from PTSD.… By creating characters with such rich, complex inner lives, Lefteri shows that in order to stretch compassion to millions of people, it helps to begin with one.
Time


[H]aunting and resonant story of Syrian war refugees undertaking a treacherous journey…. Lefteri perceptively and powerfully documents the horrors of the Syrian civil war…. Readers will find this deeply affecting for both its psychological intensity and emotional acuity.
Publishers Weekly


In fluid, forthright language, Lefteri brings us closer to the refugee experience as beekeeper Nuri and his wife… escape Aleppo and travel dangerously to Great Britain.… There’s no overloading the deck with drama; this story tells itself, absorbingly and heartrendingly.
Library Journal


Nuri’s fluid narration merges past and present into a patchwork of memory, pain, loss, and hope…. With determination laden in sorrow, Nuri and Afra strive to find their way to a new life and back to each other.
Booklist


(Starred review) [T]ouching and terrifying.… Nuri's story rings with authenticity, from the vast, impersonal cruelties of war to the tiny kindnesses that help people survive it..… A well-crafted structure and a troubled but engaging narrator power this moving story of Syrian refugees.
Kirkus Reviews