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Vincent Czyz, author of the #1 Kindle bestseller The Christos Mosaic and the award-winning Adrift in a Vanishing City, has crafted a tale of regret, revenge, and redemption—set in the fading Ottoman Empire of the nineteenth century.
Accused of heresy by a powerful Ottoman pasha, an aging Turkish alchemist flees his native Constantinople, exiling himself to a small town in the hinterlands of the East. A Muslim and a foreigner, as well as a man of letters, he finds life among a populace of stubbornly pagan peasants difficult. Yet when the pasha tracks him down, Ibn Oraybi realizes that the rural folk he’s settled among are quick witted, resourceful, and fiercely loyal. Suspecting he has more to learn from them than they do from him, he reveals the secret that has haunted him for so much of his life.
The Three Veils of Ibn Oraybi entreats readers to let go of the unalterable past and explore new vistas and alternative worldviews.
Praise for The Three Veils...
“Czyz weaves mystery, history, religious fervor, and social inspection into this story of struggle, which ends with a surprising twist... Its lovely, lyrical language and thought-provoking encounters not only bring the times to life but explore the politics and psychological profiles of cultures that lived side by side, but in very different worlds.”
— D. Donovan, Senior Reviewer, Midwest Book Review
“The Three Veils of Ibn Oraybi is an enchantment, that rare fusion of poetry and fiction, intellectual query and sensuous revelation, narrative tension and ease of telling, that I hope for each time I open a new work. In the context of a deadly struggle between dogma and reason, it spins a tale of loyalty and betrayal in which powerless women alter the fates of powerful men. Enriched by pagan and Islamic lore, it transports the reader in fresh ways to wise places. Once I started reading it, I couldn't put it down until I finished it.”
— Donald Levering, author of Previous Lives and winner of the Tor House Robinson Jeffers Prize in Poetry
Praise for Vincent Czyz...
“There are people who can write ripping yarns. And there are people who can write fine, risk-taking prose. Not that many can do both… Vincent Czyz pulls off that daring double-feat with style and verve.”
— Peter Blauner, author of Slow Motion Riot and Sunrise Highway
“Czyz is more than a bit mystical; indeed, he searches for rapture … What he’s really after, however, is to find mystery within mystery, to have experiences he cannot live without yet cannot pin down.”
— Paul West, author of The Place in Flowers Where Pollen Rests
Praise for Adrift in a Vanishing City...
“Deeply romantic (in the best sense) and darkly evocative, Czyz’s lush style explores regions well beyond simple narrative, probing the constantly shifting, oblique connections between failure, memory and the forever-incomplete nature of human desire. A moody, gorgeous and formally innovative collection, Adrift in a Vanishing City deserves a wide audience among readers who understand that fiction is about more than getting a character from one room to the next.”
— Greg Burkman, The Seattle Times
“The writing, more like poetry than prose, calls attention to language, to the fullness of a word, a sentence, with the purpose of expressing inexpressible emotions and experiences. Vincent Czyz’s Adrift in a Vanishing City is… lyrical and pensive, an odd and often beautiful portrait of longing.”
— Capper Nichols, Minnesota Daily
Genre: Historical
Accused of heresy by a powerful Ottoman pasha, an aging Turkish alchemist flees his native Constantinople, exiling himself to a small town in the hinterlands of the East. A Muslim and a foreigner, as well as a man of letters, he finds life among a populace of stubbornly pagan peasants difficult. Yet when the pasha tracks him down, Ibn Oraybi realizes that the rural folk he’s settled among are quick witted, resourceful, and fiercely loyal. Suspecting he has more to learn from them than they do from him, he reveals the secret that has haunted him for so much of his life.
The Three Veils of Ibn Oraybi entreats readers to let go of the unalterable past and explore new vistas and alternative worldviews.
Praise for The Three Veils...
“Czyz weaves mystery, history, religious fervor, and social inspection into this story of struggle, which ends with a surprising twist... Its lovely, lyrical language and thought-provoking encounters not only bring the times to life but explore the politics and psychological profiles of cultures that lived side by side, but in very different worlds.”
— D. Donovan, Senior Reviewer, Midwest Book Review
“The Three Veils of Ibn Oraybi is an enchantment, that rare fusion of poetry and fiction, intellectual query and sensuous revelation, narrative tension and ease of telling, that I hope for each time I open a new work. In the context of a deadly struggle between dogma and reason, it spins a tale of loyalty and betrayal in which powerless women alter the fates of powerful men. Enriched by pagan and Islamic lore, it transports the reader in fresh ways to wise places. Once I started reading it, I couldn't put it down until I finished it.”
— Donald Levering, author of Previous Lives and winner of the Tor House Robinson Jeffers Prize in Poetry
Praise for Vincent Czyz...
“There are people who can write ripping yarns. And there are people who can write fine, risk-taking prose. Not that many can do both… Vincent Czyz pulls off that daring double-feat with style and verve.”
— Peter Blauner, author of Slow Motion Riot and Sunrise Highway
“Czyz is more than a bit mystical; indeed, he searches for rapture … What he’s really after, however, is to find mystery within mystery, to have experiences he cannot live without yet cannot pin down.”
— Paul West, author of The Place in Flowers Where Pollen Rests
Praise for Adrift in a Vanishing City...
“Deeply romantic (in the best sense) and darkly evocative, Czyz’s lush style explores regions well beyond simple narrative, probing the constantly shifting, oblique connections between failure, memory and the forever-incomplete nature of human desire. A moody, gorgeous and formally innovative collection, Adrift in a Vanishing City deserves a wide audience among readers who understand that fiction is about more than getting a character from one room to the next.”
— Greg Burkman, The Seattle Times
“The writing, more like poetry than prose, calls attention to language, to the fullness of a word, a sentence, with the purpose of expressing inexpressible emotions and experiences. Vincent Czyz’s Adrift in a Vanishing City is… lyrical and pensive, an odd and often beautiful portrait of longing.”
— Capper Nichols, Minnesota Daily
Genre: Historical
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