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Keeping the House
The Turkish variety are prized for their enlarged leaf bud, that’s where we put the heroin… Imagine a at its centre is North London’s Turkish heroin trade, and the overlapping leaves are the stories of its players. There’s Damla, a Turkish-Cypriot girl growing up in Tottenham, and her mother Ayla, who moved there from North Cyprus in the aftermath of the 1985 Broadwater Farm riots. There’s Mehmet, a mover in the trade, and Ali, who’s got big hopes for Ayla. A bewitching debut that lifts the lid on a covert world, Keeping the House is a dynamic, electric introduction to a fascinating new voice.
248 pages, Paperback
First published September 7, 2021
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October 9, 2022
I read this book due to its longlisting for the 2022 Desmond Elliott Prize for debut novelists an award for which it is now shortlisted – although I previously knew the book as my twin brother was very proud to win it in a hotly contested (*) Twitter quiz.
(*) it may not have been hotly contested.
It was also long listed for the Gordon Burn Prize and shortlisted for the Jhalak Prize.
There is a lot to like in this book, particularly given it is a debut novel.
It is set in North London – but unlike the rather smug self-absorbed upper-Middle class Islington set that seems to dominate much literary fiction (think Ian McEwan or Charlotte Mendelson’s rather awful Women’s Prize longlisted “The Exhibitionist”) not to mention politics, this book is focused on the working class community of Tottenham/Haringey and particularly the Turkish and Turkish-Cypriot diaspora there.
Like so much of the admirable Desmond Elliott longlist it is an experimental book in a number of ways.
It is a non-linear fragmentary account (like “Somebody Loves You”), told effectively in a series of vignettes which aim to assemble and coalesce over time into a picture of a multi-generational group of women. These are Grandmother Makbule - still traumatised by the discovery of the mutilated body of her husband in the Cypriot civil war; her daughter Ayla - mother of three, who with her children’s partner in jail has to find a way to dispose of the drugs he left behind and who hatches a plot to smuggle heroin in cabbages; and her daughter Damla who gives the book part of its mixed genre feel – coming of age novel mixed with London-street novel mixed with gangster novel, albeit one with a twist by turning the focus to the female characters who “Keep the House” and which deliberately undermines with subtle comedy the supposedly macho male characters who would be the normal focus.
The book (like “Violets”, albeit to a lesser extent) mixes conventional prose with striking poetry
The book (like “Maps of Our Spectacular Bodies”, albeit to a lesser extent) includes non-standard typesetting of text. Here the text is used when foreign (typically Turkish Cypriot) words and phrases are included – with the text supplying the translation in a way which effectively I think conveys a sense of multi-culturalism and diaspora
More so than “Violets” and “Maps of Our Spectacular Bodies” the book shows the influence of Max Porter (here very explicitly as the book’s editor)
Some of the writing can be very non-standard in its use of metaphor and simile – for example I noted “These interactions, space shared with the people hustling up made against me, were comforting. We moved in parallel lines, coasting the shoreline of baskets for good finds. It me feel like I was part of something computational— were being cued up into ascending actions.”
And finally any book which has brief mentions (all positive and one really quite unusual) about each of Arsenal, Norfolk and Marmite could get an additional star for each of them.
Now for the parts I did not like so much. The book as noted concentrates on a working class group – but (like “Iron Annie” also on the longlist) does so by largely portraying this group as built around the drug trade, and illustrating this by a rather odd requirement to shift an incredible amount of heroin. In both cases I found that my interest in the book was considerably diminished by this choice and uncomfortable with a longlist that seems to equate portrayal of working class characters with portrayal of gangsters/drug dealers.
Possibly exacerbated by this I found that the story did not really coalesce for me on the way that I think the author intended – and further in what I think was meant to be at a least in part a character based novel I found too many of the characters too much of a blur despite (or even possibly because of) the cast of characters at the start. To be fair the author has said “Most of the publishers who had issues with the book wanted me to sort out my characters. They thought there were too many, or that some were too similar to each other. But people repeat themselves; in a group, everyone becomes closer in character to each other. Üzüm üzüme baka baka kararır– two grapes on a grapevine ripen each other” – but I was left a little feeling that the author could have taken more of this feedback on board.
Related to this many of the metaphors/similes seemed to misfire for me – the example above I originally noted as a negative, not positive example.
And finally the book had an early working title of “Love Letter to Tottenham” – whereas one of my all time favourite songs, particularly for singing in an enclosed space with hundreds of others has the following lyrics
Overall therefore an admirable debut which did not really work for me.
(*) this inspirational lyric may not be from this book but be my newest favourite song and which works for me much better to convey a nearby part of North London https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wjCJv...
(*) it may not have been hotly contested.
It was also long listed for the Gordon Burn Prize and shortlisted for the Jhalak Prize.
There is a lot to like in this book, particularly given it is a debut novel.
It is set in North London – but unlike the rather smug self-absorbed upper-Middle class Islington set that seems to dominate much literary fiction (think Ian McEwan or Charlotte Mendelson’s rather awful Women’s Prize longlisted “The Exhibitionist”) not to mention politics, this book is focused on the working class community of Tottenham/Haringey and particularly the Turkish and Turkish-Cypriot diaspora there.
Like so much of the admirable Desmond Elliott longlist it is an experimental book in a number of ways.
It is a non-linear fragmentary account (like “Somebody Loves You”), told effectively in a series of vignettes which aim to assemble and coalesce over time into a picture of a multi-generational group of women. These are Grandmother Makbule - still traumatised by the discovery of the mutilated body of her husband in the Cypriot civil war; her daughter Ayla - mother of three, who with her children’s partner in jail has to find a way to dispose of the drugs he left behind and who hatches a plot to smuggle heroin in cabbages; and her daughter Damla who gives the book part of its mixed genre feel – coming of age novel mixed with London-street novel mixed with gangster novel, albeit one with a twist by turning the focus to the female characters who “Keep the House” and which deliberately undermines with subtle comedy the supposedly macho male characters who would be the normal focus.
The book (like “Violets”, albeit to a lesser extent) mixes conventional prose with striking poetry
The book (like “Maps of Our Spectacular Bodies”, albeit to a lesser extent) includes non-standard typesetting of text. Here the text is used when foreign (typically Turkish Cypriot) words and phrases are included – with the text supplying the translation in a way which effectively I think conveys a sense of multi-culturalism and diaspora
More so than “Violets” and “Maps of Our Spectacular Bodies” the book shows the influence of Max Porter (here very explicitly as the book’s editor)
Some of the writing can be very non-standard in its use of metaphor and simile – for example I noted “These interactions, space shared with the people hustling up made against me, were comforting. We moved in parallel lines, coasting the shoreline of baskets for good finds. It me feel like I was part of something computational— were being cued up into ascending actions.”
And finally any book which has brief mentions (all positive and one really quite unusual) about each of Arsenal, Norfolk and Marmite could get an additional star for each of them.
Now for the parts I did not like so much. The book as noted concentrates on a working class group – but (like “Iron Annie” also on the longlist) does so by largely portraying this group as built around the drug trade, and illustrating this by a rather odd requirement to shift an incredible amount of heroin. In both cases I found that my interest in the book was considerably diminished by this choice and uncomfortable with a longlist that seems to equate portrayal of working class characters with portrayal of gangsters/drug dealers.
Possibly exacerbated by this I found that the story did not really coalesce for me on the way that I think the author intended – and further in what I think was meant to be at a least in part a character based novel I found too many of the characters too much of a blur despite (or even possibly because of) the cast of characters at the start. To be fair the author has said “Most of the publishers who had issues with the book wanted me to sort out my characters. They thought there were too many, or that some were too similar to each other. But people repeat themselves; in a group, everyone becomes closer in character to each other. Üzüm üzüme baka baka kararır– two grapes on a grapevine ripen each other” – but I was left a little feeling that the author could have taken more of this feedback on board.
Related to this many of the metaphors/similes seemed to misfire for me – the example above I originally noted as a negative, not positive example.
And finally the book had an early working title of “Love Letter to Tottenham” – whereas one of my all time favourite songs, particularly for singing in an enclosed space with hundreds of others has the following lyrics
We hate Tottenham and we hate Tottenham
We hate Tottenham and we hate Tottenham
We hate Tottenham and we hate Tottenham
We are the Tottenham haters
Overall therefore an admirable debut which did not really work for me.
North London forever
Whatever the weather
These streets are our own
And my heart will leave you never
My blood will forever
Run through the stone (*)
(*) this inspirational lyric may not be from this book but be my newest favourite song and which works for me much better to convey a nearby part of North London https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wjCJv...
June 29, 2022
Shortlisted for the 2022 Jhalak Prize and longlisted for the 2022 Desmond Elliott Prize and Gordon Burn Prize
THE LITTLE DETAILS OF OUR INTIMACY, 2006
By fifteen I’d make the dishes she taught me. Sweated onions and potatoes. Sulu yemek. Yahni. These were the meals that slid oil into you, that kept you full when you wanted to eat more but couldn’t. They heated our skin as the three of us ate on trays, flicking channels until I had to go out. While they waited outside, my friends could see me through the gaps in our curtains. I watched them from the mirror and styled my parting with a rat-tail comb, the skin on my scalp stinging under the pressure. I didn’t stop until I had the perfect zigzag part. And then I left.
The wonderful independent bookshop Burley Fisher recently tweeted a teaser as to their 2021 book of the year written by Caleb Femi their author of the year in 2020: https://twitter.com/BurleyFisher/stat...,
From reviews I had read and blurbs from other brilliant authors such as Michael Donkor in the Guardian (https://www.theguardian.com/books/202...), and Derek Owusu, Lisa McInerney, Salena Godden and Irenosen Okojie, I suspected the book was Keeping the House, and with my guess was lucky enough to win a signed copy of the novel, thanks to the author and bookshop.
Keeping the House spans the period from around 1999-2012, although non-linearly and is set in the Turkish Cypriot community in Tottenham.
The rich cast of characters is centred around three generations of women introduced in the cast list as:
Damla – Daughter of Ayla. Born in 1991.
Ayla – Washes up in high heels. Doesn’t like people who think too much.
Makbule – Mother of Ayla. Green-fingered. Varicose veins.
Makbule still suffers from PTSD from the aftermath of the 1974 conflicts in Cyprus. Ayla, after Damla's father is arrested, finds herself with some drugs she needs to dispose of, and ends up involved in the heroin smuggling trade, developing a complex scheme, inspired by the cabbages her mother once grew in Cyprus, which brings in more colourful denizens of the area such as:
Topuz Paşa/Ali – Drives cabbages. Loves bright suits. Has hopes for Ayla.
Sadi – Looks after Nehir supermarket. Always gets pickle juice in his moustache.
Agata – Crucial side character. Works in Moruk cafe.
Angela – Gives hot tupperware. Eyes beyond house. Has a little brother, Kwame.
Filiz – Thinks her dad Ufuk sells fruit on Lordship Lane as a job.
Babo/Bekir – Top boss from Mêrdîn. Loves birds.
And Damla, who narrates many of the chapters, observes them all, while coming of age. As the author explained, she is:
The fractured narrative blends in poetry and also, with inventive typesetting, embeds languages (Turkish, Greek, Turkish Cypriot, Kurmanji) into the text, as the author has explained:
It makes for a wonderfully atmospheric and different novel. 4.5 stars.
Interview with the author and her editor Max Porter:
https://www.andotherstories.org/2021/...
Another interview:
https://tinhouse.com/transcript/betwe...
THE LITTLE DETAILS OF OUR INTIMACY, 2006
By fifteen I’d make the dishes she taught me. Sweated onions and potatoes. Sulu yemek. Yahni. These were the meals that slid oil into you, that kept you full when you wanted to eat more but couldn’t. They heated our skin as the three of us ate on trays, flicking channels until I had to go out. While they waited outside, my friends could see me through the gaps in our curtains. I watched them from the mirror and styled my parting with a rat-tail comb, the skin on my scalp stinging under the pressure. I didn’t stop until I had the perfect zigzag part. And then I left.
The wonderful independent bookshop Burley Fisher recently tweeted a teaser as to their 2021 book of the year written by Caleb Femi their author of the year in 2020: https://twitter.com/BurleyFisher/stat...,
A beautifully stunning book revealing a realm of London most wouldn’t know. Through my read, I wavered between palpable nostalgia and questions about the future of the community that conceived this story.
Beyond its fresh approach to craftsmanship, it’s the enormous heart of the story that stays w/ u longer after you’ve finished reading. I’ll be rereading this book for years to come.
There is no other way to put it: here is an important writer of our generation.
From reviews I had read and blurbs from other brilliant authors such as Michael Donkor in the Guardian (https://www.theguardian.com/books/202...), and Derek Owusu, Lisa McInerney, Salena Godden and Irenosen Okojie, I suspected the book was Keeping the House, and with my guess was lucky enough to win a signed copy of the novel, thanks to the author and bookshop.
Keeping the House spans the period from around 1999-2012, although non-linearly and is set in the Turkish Cypriot community in Tottenham.
The rich cast of characters is centred around three generations of women introduced in the cast list as:
Damla – Daughter of Ayla. Born in 1991.
Ayla – Washes up in high heels. Doesn’t like people who think too much.
Makbule – Mother of Ayla. Green-fingered. Varicose veins.
Makbule still suffers from PTSD from the aftermath of the 1974 conflicts in Cyprus. Ayla, after Damla's father is arrested, finds herself with some drugs she needs to dispose of, and ends up involved in the heroin smuggling trade, developing a complex scheme, inspired by the cabbages her mother once grew in Cyprus, which brings in more colourful denizens of the area such as:
Topuz Paşa/Ali – Drives cabbages. Loves bright suits. Has hopes for Ayla.
Sadi – Looks after Nehir supermarket. Always gets pickle juice in his moustache.
Agata – Crucial side character. Works in Moruk cafe.
Angela – Gives hot tupperware. Eyes beyond house. Has a little brother, Kwame.
Filiz – Thinks her dad Ufuk sells fruit on Lordship Lane as a job.
Babo/Bekir – Top boss from Mêrdîn. Loves birds.
And Damla, who narrates many of the chapters, observes them all, while coming of age. As the author explained, she is:
almost a fly on the wall in some ways. She watches a lot of people outside of her field of reference and describes them but does not have access to their experiences in a full way. Through this, I think that became the mood that I wrote with, to use that outsider perspective as a linguistic tool and point of reference, never trying to inhabit the people I wrote about, but instead showing a specific narrator’s views of them.
The fractured narrative blends in poetry and also, with inventive typesetting, embeds languages (Turkish, Greek, Turkish Cypriot, Kurmanji) into the text, as the author has explained:
I always wanted translation to feel an active breathing voice in the book ... We wanted to experiment with the shapes of the translations, so that they sometimes broke up the lines and sometimes formed the word, this was especially the case with the translation for “maydanoz” (parsley). [Alex Billington, the typesetter] hand-drew it all tendrilly.
It makes for a wonderfully atmospheric and different novel. 4.5 stars.
Interview with the author and her editor Max Porter:
https://www.andotherstories.org/2021/...
Another interview:
https://tinhouse.com/transcript/betwe...
March 1, 2022
It is very rare for a book to exceed the promise of its blurb—Keeping the House is an electrifying debut that does this, and then some. Told in an episodic, polyphonic fashion, it serves a heady mix of grit and tenderness as a tale that may be about drugs and violence, but is not consumed by it. A crime novel about the covert machinery of heroin trade on the face of it, it is in fact a tale about the blurring and disentangling of public and private worlds of the Turkish Cypriot community in North London, and one that is therefore centered on its most privileged tellers—the women who 'keep the house':
...and yet this plot—the plot—is just scaffolding in a story running rich with cabbage pickle and “meals that slide oil into you,” with sounds and flavours and intimacies of Turkish Cypriot culture that make for the real, pulsing heart of this book. The language makes itself a fine home, too, with the author elegantly placing Turkish and Turkish Cypriot phrases in her characters’ mouths, translating them in the margins, in superscript, and in blocks of text right in the middle of the dialogue, refusing the labour and distance of appendices and footnotes. The story metamorphosises from crime novel to love stor(ies), reads in poems and the crisp exchanges fit for a screenplay, and travels from Kibris to London, from 1974 to 1999 to 2012, from mouth to mouth in a vast Cast of Characters, some of whom we meet only once and very fleetingly.
And while Ayla (sometimes Anne, the Turkish name for “mother”) is the one who “moves” the plot, it is Damla and her keen observation, lovingness, and clear voice that drives it. Damla and her secrets. Damla and her friendship with Cemile. Damla and the author’s exposition of how there is no single answer to what growing up around and amidst drug trade “really” looks like. And, of course, there is Makbule, compelled to reminisce upon a simpler life with her cabbages and ewes, but haunted by things horribly violent and even far beyond.
And they are all haunted by the men around them, the men they protect: drug overlords and responsible god-uncles and grocers and loafers and fruitsellers on Lordship Lane. These men come and go through the pages, and indeed take up many of them, and they come and go through the doors, are often absent. Yet, as the author shows us, they can have a marginality in their own lives, while the women—in a manner unlike the West's conception of women from non-white communities—have an agency that is oft unacknowledged.
The women are "keeping the house," which in all the blurring and disentangling of worlds comes to acquire many meanings. The women are Keeping the House. The women are keeping the house (afloat). This is not as much a statement of empowerment as it is of realism, for what the author does best here is give her characters dimension. What she does even better is write a story about a migrant community, and give it such a strong sense of place; place the taste of kerpuz and helim on every reader's tongue even if they have never heard of it before.
This is a book that demands attention as well as commands it. It turns the lens towards a people who may otherwise be glossed over, and explores them as more than the criminals and passive housewives they are stereotyped to be, with as much nuance and interiority as afforded to those who inhabit other, older Great London novels. It is slice-of-life, coming-of-age, crime thriller, as well as artistic assemblage. It is musical (and comes with a companion playlist). It is the one debut novel I would recommend everyone to read this year.
Damla: Daughter of Ayla. Born in 1991.When Ayla’s “baby daddy” goes to prison with a stash of heroin lying in his wake, she comes up with a plan to “move” it using Turkish cabbages grown in gardens just like the one her mother once kept...
Makbule: Mother of Ayla. Green-fingered. Varicose veins.
Ayla: Washes up in high heels. Doesn't like people who think too much.
...and yet this plot—the plot—is just scaffolding in a story running rich with cabbage pickle and “meals that slide oil into you,” with sounds and flavours and intimacies of Turkish Cypriot culture that make for the real, pulsing heart of this book. The language makes itself a fine home, too, with the author elegantly placing Turkish and Turkish Cypriot phrases in her characters’ mouths, translating them in the margins, in superscript, and in blocks of text right in the middle of the dialogue, refusing the labour and distance of appendices and footnotes. The story metamorphosises from crime novel to love stor(ies), reads in poems and the crisp exchanges fit for a screenplay, and travels from Kibris to London, from 1974 to 1999 to 2012, from mouth to mouth in a vast Cast of Characters, some of whom we meet only once and very fleetingly.
And while Ayla (sometimes Anne, the Turkish name for “mother”) is the one who “moves” the plot, it is Damla and her keen observation, lovingness, and clear voice that drives it. Damla and her secrets. Damla and her friendship with Cemile. Damla and the author’s exposition of how there is no single answer to what growing up around and amidst drug trade “really” looks like. And, of course, there is Makbule, compelled to reminisce upon a simpler life with her cabbages and ewes, but haunted by things horribly violent and even far beyond.
And they are all haunted by the men around them, the men they protect: drug overlords and responsible god-uncles and grocers and loafers and fruitsellers on Lordship Lane. These men come and go through the pages, and indeed take up many of them, and they come and go through the doors, are often absent. Yet, as the author shows us, they can have a marginality in their own lives, while the women—in a manner unlike the West's conception of women from non-white communities—have an agency that is oft unacknowledged.
The women are "keeping the house," which in all the blurring and disentangling of worlds comes to acquire many meanings. The women are Keeping the House. The women are keeping the house (afloat). This is not as much a statement of empowerment as it is of realism, for what the author does best here is give her characters dimension. What she does even better is write a story about a migrant community, and give it such a strong sense of place; place the taste of kerpuz and helim on every reader's tongue even if they have never heard of it before.
This is a book that demands attention as well as commands it. It turns the lens towards a people who may otherwise be glossed over, and explores them as more than the criminals and passive housewives they are stereotyped to be, with as much nuance and interiority as afforded to those who inhabit other, older Great London novels. It is slice-of-life, coming-of-age, crime thriller, as well as artistic assemblage. It is musical (and comes with a companion playlist). It is the one debut novel I would recommend everyone to read this year.
June 23, 2022
This is one of the three books shortlisted for the Desmond Elliott prize for debut novels. It is an affectionate but unsentimental view of a childhood in a Turkish Cypriot community in north London.
Some of the characters are involved in the heroin trade, which gives it a sharper edge, but in other ways it reminded me of another book on the Desmond Elliott longlist also published by And Other Stories, mona arshi's Somebody Loves You. Like that book it is an episodic narrative, but this one has a wider cast and more chronological jumps.
One interesting element is that instead of using footnotes, the many words borrowed from Turkish, Greek and Cypriot dialects are explained in small italic text around the main text. Whether this interrupts the flow less is a moot point.
Some of the characters are involved in the heroin trade, which gives it a sharper edge, but in other ways it reminded me of another book on the Desmond Elliott longlist also published by And Other Stories, mona arshi's Somebody Loves You. Like that book it is an episodic narrative, but this one has a wider cast and more chronological jumps.
One interesting element is that instead of using footnotes, the many words borrowed from Turkish, Greek and Cypriot dialects are explained in small italic text around the main text. Whether this interrupts the flow less is a moot point.
April 20, 2022
This is a book I came to because of its inclusion on the long list for the 2022 Desmond Elliott Prize, a prize awarded to a “first time novelist”. The great things about a long list of debut novels is that you discover some new names, often new names that you want to watch out for in the future. Tice Cin is one such name (despite my MacBook’s determination to change her name to Nice Can).
Here’s what the autobiographical details at andotherstories.org have to say about Cin:
Tice Cin is an interdisciplinary artist from north London. A London Writers Award-winner, her work has been published by Extra Teeth and Skin Deep and commissioned by places like Battersea Arts Centre and St Paul’s Cathedral. An alumnus of Barbican Young Poets, she now creates digital art as part of Design Yourself – a collective based at the Barbican Centre – exploring what it means to be human when technology is changing everything. A producer and DJ, she is releasing an EP, Keeping the House, to accompany her debut novel of the same name.
I guess that should be enough to get you interested in “Keeping the House”.
If I am honest this, for me, was one of those books that is confusing at the time of reading but rewarding when you look back. I’ve read several books like this, books where you really need to see the whole thing rather than the details. And where seeing the whole thing leads to a desire to go back and look at the details again.
In structure, the book is reminiscent of its companion on the long list, Somebody Loves You. It’s a kind of collage, a series of vignettes, that gradually merge together into an overall picture. Many of the short chapters are very impressionistic and not all the chronology is linear. It is polyphonic as the narrative voice skips around between characters. And this combination of multiple voices, jumps in time and impressionism is what means that, at least for me, the best approach is to read it without worrying to much: just enjoy the ride and see what is there in your imagination when you finish. I found that I was a bit confused during a lot of the book, but that when I finished it I had a good story in my head. Well, story might be the wrong word because this is more of a picture, a picture of Turkish communities in North London from 1999 to 2012.
There’s an underlying family saga that holds everything together. Damla is perhaps the central character, but is accompanied in the narrative by her mother Ayla and Ayla’s mother. These three women, as the book blurb tells us, work hard to keep their family and their family business afloat. Alongside Iron Annie from the same long list, the family business here involves moving huge amounts of drugs from one country to another.
But whilst the family saga is perhaps the backbone of the novel, what really makes it is the way the life of the Turkish community is portrayed. Conversations are sprinkled with Turkish words (translated for us in footnotes) and the time we spend in grocery stores and snooker halls etc. paints an evocative picture.
So, overall, this is actually a book that requires close reading and even then is likely to confuse a bit during the actual reading. But I don’t see that as a weakness - for me it is more a strength because of the overall picture that builds as you read. And I do really enjoy a book that works that way.
Here’s what the autobiographical details at andotherstories.org have to say about Cin:
Tice Cin is an interdisciplinary artist from north London. A London Writers Award-winner, her work has been published by Extra Teeth and Skin Deep and commissioned by places like Battersea Arts Centre and St Paul’s Cathedral. An alumnus of Barbican Young Poets, she now creates digital art as part of Design Yourself – a collective based at the Barbican Centre – exploring what it means to be human when technology is changing everything. A producer and DJ, she is releasing an EP, Keeping the House, to accompany her debut novel of the same name.
I guess that should be enough to get you interested in “Keeping the House”.
If I am honest this, for me, was one of those books that is confusing at the time of reading but rewarding when you look back. I’ve read several books like this, books where you really need to see the whole thing rather than the details. And where seeing the whole thing leads to a desire to go back and look at the details again.
In structure, the book is reminiscent of its companion on the long list, Somebody Loves You. It’s a kind of collage, a series of vignettes, that gradually merge together into an overall picture. Many of the short chapters are very impressionistic and not all the chronology is linear. It is polyphonic as the narrative voice skips around between characters. And this combination of multiple voices, jumps in time and impressionism is what means that, at least for me, the best approach is to read it without worrying to much: just enjoy the ride and see what is there in your imagination when you finish. I found that I was a bit confused during a lot of the book, but that when I finished it I had a good story in my head. Well, story might be the wrong word because this is more of a picture, a picture of Turkish communities in North London from 1999 to 2012.
There’s an underlying family saga that holds everything together. Damla is perhaps the central character, but is accompanied in the narrative by her mother Ayla and Ayla’s mother. These three women, as the book blurb tells us, work hard to keep their family and their family business afloat. Alongside Iron Annie from the same long list, the family business here involves moving huge amounts of drugs from one country to another.
But whilst the family saga is perhaps the backbone of the novel, what really makes it is the way the life of the Turkish community is portrayed. Conversations are sprinkled with Turkish words (translated for us in footnotes) and the time we spend in grocery stores and snooker halls etc. paints an evocative picture.
So, overall, this is actually a book that requires close reading and even then is likely to confuse a bit during the actual reading. But I don’t see that as a weakness - for me it is more a strength because of the overall picture that builds as you read. And I do really enjoy a book that works that way.
January 11, 2022
How much have you thought about cabbages in your life? Coming from the country in which cabbages feature prominently in national cuisine, I must at the same time admit that I was clueless when it comes to the idea of smuggling heroin in the heart of the vegetable and wrapped snuggly in cabbage leaves. Tice Cin, and more precisely the character created by her - fierce, not letting anyone push her around Ayla, who came up with this concept - made my head spin.
*
“Keeping the House” by Tice Cin is a spellbinding, playful pastiche of genres on one hand (isn’t life exactly that, though?) and an intimate portrait of North London Cypriot Turkish community, as supportive and protective of its members as it is slightly smothering and judgmental. Akin to layers of a cabbage leaves. A mosaic of characters, polyphonic storytelling, timelines changing with each short chapter resembling a kaleidoscope, I felt indeed as if I was looking through a kaleidoscope - seeing only a vibrantly colourful fragment of someone’s life, passing before I could adjust my focus. Phenomenal use of language as the narrative is embellished with slang, poems, profanities, fragments of text messages, as well as being multilingual - this is exactly how people speak, how people think in multicultural societies, and Cin, multidisciplinary artist from the centre of the community herself, captured it with aplomb. In a nutshell, I loved it. I haven’t read an author breaking with so many novelistic clichés for a while and “Keeping the House” brims with fresh energy and self-assurance.
*
“Keeping the House” by Tice Cin is a spellbinding, playful pastiche of genres on one hand (isn’t life exactly that, though?) and an intimate portrait of North London Cypriot Turkish community, as supportive and protective of its members as it is slightly smothering and judgmental. Akin to layers of a cabbage leaves. A mosaic of characters, polyphonic storytelling, timelines changing with each short chapter resembling a kaleidoscope, I felt indeed as if I was looking through a kaleidoscope - seeing only a vibrantly colourful fragment of someone’s life, passing before I could adjust my focus. Phenomenal use of language as the narrative is embellished with slang, poems, profanities, fragments of text messages, as well as being multilingual - this is exactly how people speak, how people think in multicultural societies, and Cin, multidisciplinary artist from the centre of the community herself, captured it with aplomb. In a nutshell, I loved it. I haven’t read an author breaking with so many novelistic clichés for a while and “Keeping the House” brims with fresh energy and self-assurance.
November 7, 2021
Really enjoyed the lyrical nature of the writing and particularly the characterisation of the women in this novel - felt so sensitive and intimate. The episodic nature of the book did make it hard to stay engaged throughout as there are quite a lot of characters. As a North London resident, I really enjoyed the setting of Tottenham and the reference to familiar places.
February 7, 2022
What do I say?
What even was this book?
I had the luxury of a visit to a real independent bookshop, and this was a staff recommendation.
I knew the subject was drugs, so I expected to be out of my comfort zone. But I thought that was a good thing. I hoped it would be an interesting read, that I would be able to recommend it to others who might also be prepared to be nudged out of their own comfort zones. Also it was supposed to be funny, and the cabbage incident from the blurb seemed interesting.
Well.
The best I can say is that I read it. Fortunately it was short, but it was still an exercise in stubbornness to keep going.
There's "out of your comfort zone" and there's "completely incomprehensible".
I feel that I was thirty years too old to understand this book.
But I also think that, even thirty years younger, the reader would need to be Turkish, based in North London, and involved in the drug scene, to get enough of the references to make sense of it and get any enjoyment from it. It has a VERY niche audience.
I got to the end, and really didn't know what I had been reading about for a lot of the time, or see what the "story" was telling me. Or if it was even a story. I just didn't get it. There wasn't really a beginning or an end, and people suddenly moved back to Turkey with no explanation why... I didn't feel I had any grasp on what was going on. The much-vaunted cabbage episode seemed to be such a tiny part of the whole thing too.
And throughout the book there were odd bits of Turkish, or occasionally other languages. These were translated with strange side notes, and this was also a distraction.
I was hoping this was going to be an interesting deviation from my usual more mainstream taste.
But no.
What even was this book?
I had the luxury of a visit to a real independent bookshop, and this was a staff recommendation.
I knew the subject was drugs, so I expected to be out of my comfort zone. But I thought that was a good thing. I hoped it would be an interesting read, that I would be able to recommend it to others who might also be prepared to be nudged out of their own comfort zones. Also it was supposed to be funny, and the cabbage incident from the blurb seemed interesting.
Well.
The best I can say is that I read it. Fortunately it was short, but it was still an exercise in stubbornness to keep going.
There's "out of your comfort zone" and there's "completely incomprehensible".
I feel that I was thirty years too old to understand this book.
But I also think that, even thirty years younger, the reader would need to be Turkish, based in North London, and involved in the drug scene, to get enough of the references to make sense of it and get any enjoyment from it. It has a VERY niche audience.
I got to the end, and really didn't know what I had been reading about for a lot of the time, or see what the "story" was telling me. Or if it was even a story. I just didn't get it. There wasn't really a beginning or an end, and people suddenly moved back to Turkey with no explanation why... I didn't feel I had any grasp on what was going on. The much-vaunted cabbage episode seemed to be such a tiny part of the whole thing too.
And throughout the book there were odd bits of Turkish, or occasionally other languages. These were translated with strange side notes, and this was also a distraction.
I was hoping this was going to be an interesting deviation from my usual more mainstream taste.
But no.
September 7, 2021
Keeping the House is a gritty tale of the London underworld, tracing the lives of children growing up among the drug trade and the adults who surround them. It's told through vignettes which are as disjointed and disassembled as the lives of the characters: the characters' roots are scattered from Turkey and Cyprus to London, while the children are the product of absent, sometimes abusive fathers, raised by a stand-in family of neighbours and their ethnic community.
This debut novel is unlike anything else I've ever read. It is not just a story about drugs. The author cleverly weaves more complex themes such as racial stereotypes, poverty and violence underneath the intoxicating sheen of pure-white heroin. Dialectical phrases are scribbled in the margins, further emphasising how the characters sit on the periphery, never quite belonging in one place. It is a cultural commentary and one that is devastatingly relevant today.
*ad-pr note: I was kindly gifted an ARC from the publisher (And Other Stories), but all thoughts are my own.
"She told me to look at the men who break women's spirits. To look at their skin. The sheen of sweat climbing their throats. Their flushed skin. The way their smiles curdled into impish stretches of lip and rotting teeth. [...] Men who break a good woman start to rot from the inside, out."
This debut novel is unlike anything else I've ever read. It is not just a story about drugs. The author cleverly weaves more complex themes such as racial stereotypes, poverty and violence underneath the intoxicating sheen of pure-white heroin. Dialectical phrases are scribbled in the margins, further emphasising how the characters sit on the periphery, never quite belonging in one place. It is a cultural commentary and one that is devastatingly relevant today.
*ad-pr note: I was kindly gifted an ARC from the publisher (And Other Stories), but all thoughts are my own.
"She told me to look at the men who break women's spirits. To look at their skin. The sheen of sweat climbing their throats. Their flushed skin. The way their smiles curdled into impish stretches of lip and rotting teeth. [...] Men who break a good woman start to rot from the inside, out."
Read
February 15, 2022just so good. went to a book talk with tice last week and the conversation kept looping back to tenderness and intimacy. she said this one thing about how the book's cabbage-leaf formation (cabbages are the central conceit of the heroin trade here) was also a way of pillowing its sharper moments, how there's always this other thing – a kind of gentle goodness – that runs through them, how at the same time you find out that someone's an addict there's bread being put down on the table. most of the book is pitched in a dry witty tone but it feels very rich and alive. a lot of little objects lying about and music everywhere, characters to follow and lose and find again.
March 13, 2022
Part 1: This is fucking amazing, I love it. The language, the layout, the syntax, OMG, Tice Cin is brilliant.
Part 2: I suspect this is great but I'm getting confused with who is who. Which one's he? Is he the old guy or the young guy? Why is he saying that? Who is even narrating? Wait, what year is it? Oh good, there's a character list at the start. Nope, that doesn't help. Who's 'Anne'? So, did the husband own the supermarket? Why did they beat that guy up? Hang on, who's she?
Part 3: Did I miss something about Cemile and her her importance to the story? This is fizzling out.
Part 2: I suspect this is great but I'm getting confused with who is who. Which one's he? Is he the old guy or the young guy? Why is he saying that? Who is even narrating? Wait, what year is it? Oh good, there's a character list at the start. Nope, that doesn't help. Who's 'Anne'? So, did the husband own the supermarket? Why did they beat that guy up? Hang on, who's she?
Part 3: Did I miss something about Cemile and her her importance to the story? This is fizzling out.
January 3, 2025
At the beginning I really liked this book, the writing style, the fragments of poetry and I even thought I might end up giving it 5 stars. But it just kind of … went nowhere. What semblance of a plot appeared around 50 pages in dropped off after page 100. I liked the atmosphere of the book for sure, but a book should be more than random observations about life in north London. Unfortunately, the author seemed to have forgotten that a book actually needs to have some kind of story in it.
September 20, 2025
Beautiful & made me cry. Lots of rhythm…….. poetry…….. wow. Love!!!!
September 18, 2025
so experimental/polyphonic and poetic! reached my wit’s end with boring novels about middle class alienation and petty discord and stumbled on this after seeing Cin recite her poetry a few weeks ago. A really strong debut novel !!
March 31, 2022
A Turkish Muslim immigrant community within London hiding heroin in cabbages... The plot was interesting enough to hold my attention and make me finish it, but I can't say I connected to or cared about any of the characters (a nail in the coffin for any character driven reader such as myself).
I found it a bit hectic structurally, making it hard to keep up with who's who (double checking the blurb on several occasions to see who's related/significant to who). We jump back and forth between different characters and timelines, I don't normally have a problem with this, suggesting to me the style was just badly handled by the author. I listened to it on audiobook and wondered if this was why I had an issue but looking at other reviews by people who read both the physical book and the ebook, they echo my sentiments, and so I feel justified in my judgement here.
I'll be interested to see if this book does anything more than be longlisted for the Jhalak prize & the Dylan Thomas prize and shortlisted for the British book awards this year (2022).
It was fine. Will I remember it? Probably not. Will I recommend it? Probably not.
Update: it did not go any further than the longlist for the Dylan Thomas prize.
I found it a bit hectic structurally, making it hard to keep up with who's who (double checking the blurb on several occasions to see who's related/significant to who). We jump back and forth between different characters and timelines, I don't normally have a problem with this, suggesting to me the style was just badly handled by the author. I listened to it on audiobook and wondered if this was why I had an issue but looking at other reviews by people who read both the physical book and the ebook, they echo my sentiments, and so I feel justified in my judgement here.
I'll be interested to see if this book does anything more than be longlisted for the Jhalak prize & the Dylan Thomas prize and shortlisted for the British book awards this year (2022).
It was fine. Will I remember it? Probably not. Will I recommend it? Probably not.
Update: it did not go any further than the longlist for the Dylan Thomas prize.
Read
May 5, 2022It would not be fair for me to rate this book. I read it in audio and, but for the GR blurb and others' reviews, would have no idea what this book is about. It does not work in audio. I read it because it is on the longlist for the Desmond Elliot prize for first novel. The narrator of the audiobook did not work for me - too monotonal. I doubt I will try it in another format, so will just leave this review as one recommending that the book NOT be read in audio.
January 5, 2022
beautiful and entrancing, diving and resurfacing through the lives of various turkish cypriot families and their desire for status, wealth, security, family, love. unpredictable and lyrical. not often i'm invested in the lives of men in books, but i am here. the women, though, deserve a special shout out; i love damla and cemile!
March 5, 2022
There is something so gripping about Cin's prose and the glimpse she gives us into another life. I loved the drifts into surrealism and unexpected twists in relationships. But this is the rare book where jumping around in time didn't add anything -- there are so many characters and plot lines to follow; I didn't need to be disoriented as to time and place.
August 22, 2021
I wanted to love this book so much, coming from And Other Stories. But it’s hard to get through most chapters understanding what you previously read. I found this book incoherent and very disappointing.
I’m too nice to leave the 1 star I think this book deserves.
I’m too nice to leave the 1 star I think this book deserves.
November 6, 2022
Reminiscence, diaspora
Longing, smuggling
Cabbages, belly fat
Swollen feet, keeping the shop
Then maybe the house too.
Longing, smuggling
Cabbages, belly fat
Swollen feet, keeping the shop
Then maybe the house too.
August 20, 2022
This novel is such a gorgeous collage of the community of Tottenham: its watermelons and lahmacun stands and quick-witted mothers and mosaic of languages. Cin uses an inventive syntax on the pages, with translation notes in the margins and chapters like EP titles and paragraphs that descend into poetry, which is unlike anything I've come across in a novel before. But don't be fooled! Behind the sheen and intrigue of the novel is a tapestry of complex characters and histories. Cin is an enormously talented poet, and her sentences shine: inventive, sharp, subtle, full of joy.
"His veins jumped and moved in his hands and he gripped the border between us to still himself. Following these veins, from the curves of his triceps to the brick wall, I thought to myself: they are pointed at me. "
"Cadaveric spasm, also known as instantaneous rigor, cataleptic rigidity and zombie mode. The exposed muscle is contacting and life is like that, bouncing hopla hopla when you shouldn't. The dead body forces itself not to forget life; it insists."
The novel can be is heavy at times, as it deals with a diversity of trauma from the invasion of Cyprus to sexual abuse. But it is also balanced by moments of levity and small joy. This is really a story of a community disguised as a coming-of-age disguised as a crime story and even if you aren't familiar with the Turkish Cypriot community in London, Cin paints her world with so much care that you can't help but be invited into the kitchens and storefronts of this community.
"His veins jumped and moved in his hands and he gripped the border between us to still himself. Following these veins, from the curves of his triceps to the brick wall, I thought to myself: they are pointed at me. "
"Cadaveric spasm, also known as instantaneous rigor, cataleptic rigidity and zombie mode. The exposed muscle is contacting and life is like that, bouncing hopla hopla when you shouldn't. The dead body forces itself not to forget life; it insists."
The novel can be is heavy at times, as it deals with a diversity of trauma from the invasion of Cyprus to sexual abuse. But it is also balanced by moments of levity and small joy. This is really a story of a community disguised as a coming-of-age disguised as a crime story and even if you aren't familiar with the Turkish Cypriot community in London, Cin paints her world with so much care that you can't help but be invited into the kitchens and storefronts of this community.
January 17, 2024
I really liked this book. It took me a bit to get used to the writing style, it's very poetic and I found it quite jarring at first. It was hard to get a sense of place or even who was involved in what at first. Eventually you get used to it though and after a few chapters I found it to be a really lovely read.
Damla is the standout character for me, the heroin stuff is a nice backdrop to it all but doesn't really interest me much.
There's a whole chapter called Damla: Nothing left out (or something) that basically jumps forward and shows Damla as a WOMAN, not a GIRL. She's chatting about shitty boyfriends she has been with. A train cleaner who likes swords, a guy called William who she thinks she should go back to (but not really).
I enjoyed the bit about her boyfriends just using the same algorithms in bed, and how she's lying on the ghosts of their previous girlfriends. Also when train-sword ex gets beaten up by Topaz (or whichever guy is in the car with her), he brings a sword back and she explains in lots of detail about what the sword is which I really liked. I imagine it's a reference to how guys can bore women with their stupid toys and the women just sort of remember this stuff whether they want to or not. She ends it with "I can't wait to leave it in the rain" which I found very funny.
Also the subtle hints at her feelings towards Camile that by the end are very not subtle are really well executed too.
When I read a good book it bangs around in my head a lot and I feel like I'm thinking like the book in some ways. Pointing out things that the book would point out, that sort of thing. I spend a lot of time in silence during these moments because my brain is just happy churning over what I've just read and taking it all in. This is happened for this book so it gets nine thumbs up from me.
Banger overall.
Damla is the standout character for me, the heroin stuff is a nice backdrop to it all but doesn't really interest me much.
There's a whole chapter called Damla: Nothing left out (or something) that basically jumps forward and shows Damla as a WOMAN, not a GIRL. She's chatting about shitty boyfriends she has been with. A train cleaner who likes swords, a guy called William who she thinks she should go back to (but not really).
I enjoyed the bit about her boyfriends just using the same algorithms in bed, and how she's lying on the ghosts of their previous girlfriends. Also when train-sword ex gets beaten up by Topaz (or whichever guy is in the car with her), he brings a sword back and she explains in lots of detail about what the sword is which I really liked. I imagine it's a reference to how guys can bore women with their stupid toys and the women just sort of remember this stuff whether they want to or not. She ends it with "I can't wait to leave it in the rain" which I found very funny.
Also the subtle hints at her feelings towards Camile that by the end are very not subtle are really well executed too.
When I read a good book it bangs around in my head a lot and I feel like I'm thinking like the book in some ways. Pointing out things that the book would point out, that sort of thing. I spend a lot of time in silence during these moments because my brain is just happy churning over what I've just read and taking it all in. This is happened for this book so it gets nine thumbs up from me.
Banger overall.
July 28, 2025
It's a testament to the quality of Cin's figurative writing that I've rated this novel so highly despite spending large chunks of it really struggling to understand what was going on. Partly this was down to the frequent use of Turkish and Turkish Cypriot phrases, which, though translated in footnotes, made for a more challenging read, and partly down to the sheer number of characters, some of whom had multiple names (I think?) and some of whom appeared only a handful of times, popping in and out of the narrative and, frankly, confusing me. The book is about the lives of Turkish and Turkish Cypriot families living in Tottenham and involved in various illegal activities, and that's as much as I can say.
I might not be able to explain much of what happened in the overall story, but taking each short chapter as its own vignette, this was such a beautifully written work. I think perhaps it wanted to be a collection of poetry? I loved the characters of Damla and Cemile, even if I didn't understand a lot of what was happening between and to them, and was blown away by the creativeness of Cin's similes, metaphors, and descriptive language.
I might not be able to explain much of what happened in the overall story, but taking each short chapter as its own vignette, this was such a beautifully written work. I think perhaps it wanted to be a collection of poetry? I loved the characters of Damla and Cemile, even if I didn't understand a lot of what was happening between and to them, and was blown away by the creativeness of Cin's similes, metaphors, and descriptive language.
January 1, 2022
Cin conveys a really strong sense of place in this novel, bringing Haringey to life in the tradition of Zadie Smith. I really felt like I got a flavour of how it feels to be Turkish/Cypriot in North London and the descriptions of food and cooking in particular added a lot of dimension to this book. Cin is also skilled at capturing the idiosyncrasies of her characters, doing so with humour and warmth. However, I did feel like more development of the novel's female characters would have made the book better, as a lot of the males merged into one and I wouldn't say the sections dedicated to some of their conversations, while entertaining, were especially significant in moving the plot forward. For instance, I had almost forgotten who Cemile was by the time she is reintroduced at the point when her and Damla first become friends. I would also say it wasn't clear where the novel was trying to go with the storyline around the heroin and the cabbages, as this just seems to tail off, and doesn't serve to develop characters like Ayla as much as it could have done.
November 27, 2025
The author of this novel is very creative and gets up to a lot of different creative things. I believe that before this they were writing poetry which I can see through the style of the text; it's very modern poetry.
This one for me was ok. I wouldn't say that it was memorable, except for , but it's not terribly written either. I think my favourite aspect of the book was seeing and learning a little more about Turkish-British culture, especially in this day and age when they are more well known for barbers than anything else.
It's an ok read but I definitely wouldn't call this one of my favourite books of all time.
This one for me was ok. I wouldn't say that it was memorable, except for , but it's not terribly written either. I think my favourite aspect of the book was seeing and learning a little more about Turkish-British culture, especially in this day and age when they are more well known for barbers than anything else.
It's an ok read but I definitely wouldn't call this one of my favourite books of all time.
July 17, 2021
The latest arrival from And Other Stories. An endearing if scatter-minded tale of life in the Turkish Cypriot community in north east London. Structured as a series of short vignettes, it follows half a dozen interesting and lively characters during the first decade of this century as they immigrate, settle, grow up, and emigrate again — their lives filled with cooking, loving and selling drugs. The author skilfully allows the reader to never forget the ever-present criminal violence whilst making the narrative about a wider truth.
December 11, 2021
DNF at 60%.
Good things:
- the writing itself
- the subject matter
Bad things:
- the choice to make some of the characters Turkish Cypriot. you can't expect me to feel bad for them for having to leave?
- the dialogue format
- the execution
- the dialogues themselves
- the fact that the author could've talked about how things like drug trade ruin lives without it being so detached
- the goddamn. dialogue. it never felt genuine, fairly sure AI chat robots speak more naturally.
1.5 stars rounded down. So much potential flushed down the drain.
Good things:
- the writing itself
- the subject matter
Bad things:
- the choice to make some of the characters Turkish Cypriot. you can't expect me to feel bad for them for having to leave?
- the dialogue format
- the execution
- the dialogues themselves
- the fact that the author could've talked about how things like drug trade ruin lives without it being so detached
- the goddamn. dialogue. it never felt genuine, fairly sure AI chat robots speak more naturally.
1.5 stars rounded down. So much potential flushed down the drain.
April 17, 2022
Keeping the House offers the reader a visceral slice of life, but it’s a tough read which jumps between characters, places, and timelines. I enjoyed the snatches of poetry, and the way Tice Cin wrote about violence so as not to linger on unnecessary details. I just wish there had been a clearer message or arc, to bring a little more cohesion to this ambitious story. Definitely an author I’d be interested in reading more from, and perhaps a book to return to one day.
I wanted to read this book because it has been nominated for this year’s Jhalak Prize.
I wanted to read this book because it has been nominated for this year’s Jhalak Prize.
August 25, 2025
This is the most confusing audiobook I’ve ever listened to. It’s impossible to figure out who’s who, what’s happening, and whose perspective I’m listening to. I only got a very nebulous idea of the themes discussed. I don’t think it’s the fault of the book though. Its fragmented, experimental, and nonlinear narrative probably doesn’t lend itself well to an audiobook adaptation. The premise still sounds interesting to me, so I’ll read the print edition to figure out what the book is really about.
October 1, 2021
In subtle, poetic small portions Tice Cin tells the story of Ayla and her oldest daughter Damla, but also of other people close to them on the Farm estate in Tottenham and Cypress. In short glimpses from the perspectives of several characters of different generations the reader navigates through a never ending stream of male violence and the pores, sometimes even spaces of freedom some of the women open up for themselves through wit, will and repression. Both a sobering and reassuring read.
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