DVD: The Promise

The Promise is a fictional account of the systematic extermination of the Armenian Christian population undertaken by the Ottoman Empire during World War I. This event has become known as the Armenian Genocide. The movie, directed by George Kelly was made partly to bring attention to this war crime which has never been acknowledged by many Western countries nor by Turkey.

The story begins on the eve of World War I in 1914, in the vast Ottoman Turk Empire. The story is narrated by Michael Boghosian whose family have been apothecaries in the village of Siroun, Southern Turkey for two hundred years. They have served both Christians and Muslims.

Micheal wanted to study medicine at the Imperial School of Medicine in Constantinople but could not afford the fees. He became engaged to Maral and it was decided that he would use the money from her dowry to go to medical school and then return to Siroun to marry her.

At the engagement party, Maral's father Harut gives Michael four hundred gold coins and tells him to make them proud. Michael's father, Vartan gives him a letter for his Uncle Mesrob who lives in Constantinople. Michael tells Maral that he will do the three years of medical studies in two years.

Michael travels to Constantinople where he meets Mesrob, his wife Lena and their two daughters, Yeva and Tamar. He also meets Ana Khesarian, daughter of a famous violinist who is tutor to the Boghosian children. At medical school, Michael meets a Turk, Emre Ogan who is not really interested in medicine but had to choose between it and the military. That Emre is not suited for the medical profession is shown when he faints during a dissection.

Ana and Chris Myers

After class one day Michael meets Ana while she is teaching Yeva and Tamar. He finds her delightful. At a club, Ana introduces Michael and Emre to her friend and lover, Christopher Myers, who immediately recognizes Emre as a playboy who frequents opium dens.Emre tells Michael and Ana that he and Chris know one another from Paris when his father was Deputy Consul and that Chris is a renowned reporter for Associated Press. Chris warns that war is coming to Turkey. At the end of the evening Emre begs them to come to his birthday party that Sunday at Ciragan Palace.

At the party, German warships fire a salute, scaring many who are in attendance. Chris confronts the Germans in attendance, resulting in Emre's father stating that Turkey has every right to have a strong navy to protect its borders. Chris counters that the Turks want to expand their borders and declare war on the infidels - the British, French and Russians. When the German's break out in singing the national anthem, Chris reminds Michael, that  the Armenians are the resident "infidels" and will be the first to be attacked.

Michael attempts to register for a medical school exemption.

On October 29, 1914, Turkey enters World War I on the side of Germany. Immediately all men are enlisted. At the medical school, Michael learns he will not be given a medical school exemption and he is assigned to the third military division while Emre, a Turk is given one. Emre saves Michael by bribing the official to produce the exemption. But this bribe has not gone unnoticed. At the same time Chris sets out to investigate what is happening in Konya. Before he leaves, Chris tells Ana he will obtain an American visa for her but she refuses his help.

Meanwhile Emre is confronted by his father who questions him about the exemption given to Michael Boghosian. Dr. Nazim does not accept Emre's explanation that Michael is a friend, telling him the Armenians are a tumour on the nation that must be removed.  Michael returns to Mesrob's home where he is made an offer by his uncle to buy him out of his betrothal to Ana. Michael refuses stating he has made a promise that he intends to honour.

Chris's investigations reveal that Armenian villages are being burned to the ground and men are being hanged. He also discovers hundreds of people being marched into the desert and witnesses a woman being shot in front of a small child. Meanwhile in Constantinople, things begin deteriorating. After returning from a concert at the cathedral Ana and Michael barely escape from raging Turks who destroy Armenian shops and beat Armenian citizens in the streets. At this time, Mesrob is arrested, leaving Lena alone with their daughters.

During this night, Michael and Ana become intimately involved. The next day they visit Lena and learn that Mesrob has been taken to Sikedji Prison where he is being investigated for treason. Michael takes the remaining gold from his dowry and he and Emre attempt to bribe the Turks at the prison to release Mesrob. Instead, they take his gold and Michael is arrested while Emre is forced by his father to enlist in the military.

What Chris has feared has come to pass - the Armenians are being slaughtered by the Turks, who are determined to rid themselves of infidels. Determined to reveal to the world what is happening Chris contacts American Ambassador Morgenthau. Chris becomes determined to save the woman he loves and as many of the Armenians as possible. He will barely escape with his own life while most of those he has come to love will not be so fortunate.


Discussion

The Promise is a moving tribute to the 1.5 million Armenian Christians who were systematically murdered during World War I by the Turk government. Although there had been previous massacres, for example the Hamidian massacres in the late 1800's by Sultan Abdul Hamid II, international pressure had been brought to bear to stop these massacres. This was not the case in 1915. Instead, western governments dallied when confronted by what was happening, at the expense of millions of lives.

Wonderful performances are given by Oscar Isaac who plays Michael Boghosian, as well as Charlotte Le Bon and Christian Bale who portray Ana Khesarian and Chris Myers respectively. A strong cast of secondary characters,  Marta (Shohreh Aghdashloo), Emre Ogan ( Marwan Kenzari ) and Faruk Pasha (Tamer Hassan) round out the cast.

French helping Armenians onto French warship at Musa Dagh.

Breathtaking cinematography provides a film of stark contrasts. There is the incredible beauty of the Turkish countryside juxtaposed with the horrors of the genocide. Scenes of Armenian Christians being marched into the desert, of whole villages of Armenian Christians shot and bayoneted, of the rounding up and brutalization of Armenian men, of the work camps, and of rail cars packed with Armenian women and children are in sharp contrast to the picturesque villages and the peaceful forests. The happy lives of the Armenians as they live peacefully with their Muslim neighbours and the beautiful Christian service with Father Komitas is in contrast to the Muslim crowd rampaging through the Constantinople destroying businesses, beating and arresting Armenians. 

The movie's final scenes portray the attack on over four thousand Armenians at Musa Dagh and their rescue by the French. Chris, Michael, Yeva and Ana  are among those making their way to the shore along with other survivors. In fact, on September 12, 1915, the French Navy rescued more than four thousand trapped and unarmed Armenians from Musa Dagh mountain.

The obfuscation of Turkish officials when questioned is very effectively portrayed, particularly in the scene where Ambassador Morgenthau confronts Turkish officials. Not all Turks are portrayed badly; Emre Ogan loses his life for helping save the life of his friend Chris Myers and the Deputy Consul warns Pastor Merrill at the American mission that Faruk Pasha will spare no one and they should leave at once.

Unfortunately, the development of a love triangle involving Michael, Chris and Ana detracts from the main focus of the film. The Armenian Genocide is such a significant human story it doesn't require a plot device like a love triangle to engage viewers. Where the film succeeds is in portraying the humanity of the Armenians who love, marry and have children while the world around them goes to hell. Overall though, The Promise mostly succeeds in portraying a significant event of the 20th century and one in which the term "genocide" was first used to describe the systematic killing of a race of people. It is hoped that more films will be made to educate people on a genocide the much of the world still refuse to acknowledge.

Like Water On Stone by Dana Walrath

 Like Water on Stone tells the story in free verse of the Donabedian family during the Armenian genocide of 1915 to 1919.  The family consists of Papa, Mama, older brothers Kevorg and Misak, Anahid, thirteen year old Shahen and his twin sister Sosi and their younger sister, five year old Mariam who live in Palu, deep inside the Ottoman Empire. The Donabedian family are Armenian Christians who live in a country ruled by Muslim Turks and Kurds. Their Papa survived the 1895 massacre of Christians ordered by Sultan Hamid.

In Part I Palu 1914 the poems portray the everyday life in Palu in which the lives of Muslim Turks and Kurds and Armenian Christians are seemingly intertwined with one another. Yet there are signs that all is not well.  For example, Shahen's older sister, Anahid has married Asan, a Kurd. This makes other Armenian families reluctant to marry their daughters to the older Donabedian boys. Mama insists that they must marry their own kind- that is other Christians. Sosi is being taught by her Mama how to run a household, to cook, to dye wool, to weave and to bargain for fabrics. When they go to purchase wool they are insulted by the Turks they purchase fabric from. But Sosi's mother reminds her daughter that despite being ruled for miles by Turks, the land they live on belongs to the Armenians who planted the olive trees. Papa considers the Turks his friends; they make music together but do the Turks and Kurds feel the same way about the Armenian Christians?

The poetry also portrays life in Palu in 1914. Throughout the summer of 1914, Shahen and Sosi carry baskets of apricots from the trees that lined the river up to the roof to be dried. Meanwhile Shahen tried to convince his Papa to let him travel to America, but Papa wants him to study with Father Manoog so he can go to college in Kharpert. Papa's friends, his daughter's inlaws Palewan and her husband Kaban with his duduk and zurna and Mustafa Bey Injeli and his dumbek come to play music with him. Days later Anahid comes from the market with a poem written in the hand of Vahan, the son of Baron Bedros, a Turk, whom Sosi loves. As the summer passes, the olives ripen to black and the grapes are harvested.

The Donabedian family receives a letter from Mama's brother who lives in New York, warning them that war has begun and they must leave the Ottoman Empire. He asks them to at least send Shahen to America but Papa refuses saying that the Turks and Kurds he knows are his friends and that they will not harm them.  However, as summer slips into autumn and the persimmons ripen, the Turks fights the Russians and the Armenians are expected to fight alongside the Turks. Shahen begs Papa to send him and Misak and Kevorg to America. "Papa will not listen."

Part II Massacre 1915 opens with soldiers coming to the Donabedian mill searching for weapons.  When the family have no weapons to give the soldiers as they are millers, they are threatened with arrest. Armenians are sent to build the Baghdad Railway and Anahid's husband, Asan is sent to fight at the Russian front. While their leaders and men are imprisoned, other families go into hiding or leave. One such family is the Arkalian's whom Father Manoog blesses before they leave.

Despite Papa's assurances that they are safe, soldiers come to the mill and arrest Kevorg and Misak. Baron Kaban and Baron Mustafa vouch for Papa and his family and the Turkish soldiers leave but the family fear for Shahen who is in school. Shahen manages to sneak home and his parents dress him as a girl so he will not be taken away as his brothers were. Then at dawn one day, Papa tells Shahen to take his sisters, Sosi and Mariam to the highest field and not to return until they come for them. If they do not, he is to take them south to Aleppo to the Forty Martyrs Church where there is a priest who helped their uncle travel to America. Shahen, Sosi and Mariam run into the hills in the hopes of meeting their parents again. But the horrifying screams tell Shahen that probably Papa and Mama will not be coming to get them. And so Shahen begins the journey over the mountains and across the desert to Aleppo. It is a journey that will see their faith, their perseverance tested to the limit.

Part III  Journey 1915 and Part IV 1919 provide the details of Shahen and his sisters' journey to Aleppo and what happens when they arrive there.

Discussion

The story in Like Water On Stone mirrors the events of author Dana Walrath's Armenian ancestors. Her mother's mother (Dana Walrath's grandmother) Oghidar Troshagirian hid during the day and travelled at night with her siblings after their parents were killed, in order to escape the massacre. Like many descendants of survivors of the Armenian genocide, Walrath knows little about what happened to her grandparents (her grandfather Yeghishe Mashoian was also a survivor) as this horrific event was something not spoken about. Walrath knows that once her grandmother arrived in Aleppo she and her siblings were able to emigrate to America because her maternal uncle lived in New York. She also learned that her family were millers in Palu and that several older siblings of her grandmother did escape as well.

In 1984, Walrath and her husband travelled to Palu where they asked people living in the area about the location of nearby mills. They eventually found a mill with buildings attached in the woods near a fast flowing stream. They met a woman whose family now owned the mill. "She said that the mill had been in her family for sixty years; before that, it had belonged to Armenians. With anti-Armenian stories running Turkish newspapers that summer, and all visible traces of Armenian inhabitants systematically denied or destroyed, I had kept my identity hidden as we traveled. But I told her the truth. We held each other's gaze as the water hit the mill wheel and the stone of the stream. The official Turkish policy of genocide denial evaporated for one brief moment on that rooftop."

The story of the Donabedian family is told in four voices, Shahen, Sosi, Mariam and the eagle, Ardziv. Ardziv becomes attached to the family when Sosi finds a quill from the eagle one day while dyeing wool. The feather will be used by her Papa to make music on his oud. The eagle feels that

"If my quill could pull laments
from the strings of an oud,
I thought, then
my heart might heal."

Ardziv had a mate and young birds in the nest before his mate was killed. The killing of Ardziv's mate by a Turkish man is a foreshadowing of the genocide. The killing is senseless in the eyes of the eagle, who hunts only for food. But as he watched the Turk and his son pluck the feathers from her wings and leave her carcass for the vultures Ardziv realized his mate's killing was done for her feathers and nothing else. Because of this Ardziv decides to watch over the three young people as they journey south through the mountains towards Aleppo.

It is Ardziv who first sees the movement of soldiers faraway.
"In distant lands
lines of soldiers
moved locust-like.
across  the earth,
their bodies clad
in identical
greens and browns,
rifles up like antennae."

And later on Ardziv sees the truth behind the Armenian men who are marched along.
"I followed the soldiers
with every fit 
Armenian man....
They walked them
in a line
along the river
for miles,
pushing
and poking
with guns,
their hands tied.
They stopped.
They stripped them.
They turned them.
They shot them.
They threw the bodies
into the river."

When Papa realizes his mistake too late, he reaches up towards Ardziv stating "No land is worth a child's life. Protect them. Please."
Ardziv states,
"I made a promise
to the empty sky.
These three young ones
would not die."

When Shahen hides with his sisters on the hilltop, Ardziv circles watching them and as they leave Palu, he follows the three young people as they go high up into the mountains to be safe. When Ardziv sees that Mariam is starving he begins to hunt for the three bringing them rabbit and snake to eat. And when a brown bear begins following them after catching the scent of blood, Ardziv leads her away from Shahen and his siblings. And when Shahen and Mariam are hurt after falling into a crack in the rocks, the eagle leads Sosi to where she can find food. The eagle accompanies them across the desert to Aleppo. Again and again, he comes to the children's aid.

Ardziv serves as the one narrator who is not in danger and who can protect the children. The eagle sees the full extent of the genocide from his vantage point in the sky. He knows the danger the Turks present because he has experienced it himself. Through the eagles eyes the reader experiences the horrors of the genocide, the murder of the men by the river and the mutilation and death of Papa and Mama. He is a the one character through which the author can express the feelings of terror, horror and anger that the mass killings evoke.

Walrath's poetry is eloquent and deeply touching. Though simple and even sparse at times, the beautiful poems in this novel express the true horror of the Armenian genocide. After setting up in detail the way the Christian Armenians live - their strong family life, the dyeing of wool, harvesting of apricots to be dried on the rooftops, the picking olives and grapes, the pruning of grape vines, the work in the mill, the music of the oud- as the story moves forward, the poems portray the terror, suffering and the overwhelming sense of loss the Armenian community experiences as first their men are rounded up and then family after family are butchered, some burned alive in their homes, others raped, mutilated and beheaded.

Sometimes it is what is not said by Walrath's poems that conveys the horror so effectively. After months in the mountains, the realization  that Mama and Papa will not meet them in Aleppo and that Misak and Kevorg are likely dead, comes to thirteen year old Sosi, Despite this awful revelation, the novel ends on a hopeful note - a future in America where they can be free, something that 1.5 million Armenians never had the chance.

Demonstrating that not all Muslims cooperated in the genocide, Walrath includes numerous honourable Turks, including Mustafa who binds his wife, Fatima, so she will not reveal what she knows about the Donabedians, Kaban, Palewan and Mustafa who wash and bury Papa and Mama and the kindly Bedouin who takes the three Donabedian children into his care in the desert, making sure they get safely to Aleppo.

Sadly the conflict between Muslims and Christians continues in the part of the world today, over one hundred years later with the destruction of the Armenian Holy Martyrs Church in Der Zor, Syria. This church was set up as a memorial to the victims of the Armenian Genocide and was brazenly destroyed by the militant Muslim group ISIS.

There are many excellent resources online and in print about the Armenian Genocide. Dana Walrath has included a long Author's Note, a Glossary, a map, and a detailed list of Resources for readers to explore in her novel.

Those interested in history, especially World War I, and who wish a more personal touch to their historical fiction will find Like Water On Stone to be engaging. Although deeply tragic, the element of hope and thankfulness permeates the ending.  Shahen knows what could have been his and his sisters' fate - a death march or a forced conversion to Islam. There's no sugar coating what was done. Like Water On Stone is historical fiction at its best - vivid, realistic and factual.

Book Details:
Like Water On Stone by Dana Walrath
New York: Delacorte Press     2014
353 pp.

Dance of the Banished by Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch

Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch"s Dance of the Banished explores the controversial Armenian genocide which occurred almost 100 years ago in Ottoman Turkey. Repeatedly denied by the government of Turkey over the past century, the 20th century's first large scale genocide took place in the Anatolia region as Turks turned on their Armenian Christian citizens and annihilated them through mass murder and death marches into the desert. Despite Turkey's repeated refusal to acknowledge internationally the Armenian genocide, there is much evidence proving the Young Turk government's mass murder of its Christian population, the destruction of Armenian culture and intelligentsia, including the seizure of property and the desecration of Armenian holy sites.International recognition of the Armenian genocide has been slow and hindered by political interference as Turkey is important geographically to the United States and other NATO countries.

Almost one hundred years later,  the region to the south has experienced yet another violent "cleansing" by a radical Muslim group known as Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), which seeks to establish a Sunni caliphate in the area. Armenian and Syrian Christians, Yazidis, and Shi'ite Muslims are the victims of  ethnic cleansing in this modern conflict.

Ali Hassan announces to his beloved Zeynep that he will be traveling to Canada.Hagop Gregorian was to have taken Ali's younger brother, Yousef, with him to Canada but instead will take Ali. The men worked in other countries sending money home for their wives to pay taxes and support their families. Ali promises Zeynep that he will return to marry her, giving her a journal and asking her to use it to record what is happening to her and then mail it to him. He promises to do the same with his journal. But Zeynep will have none of it. She tells Ali she will not wait for him and refuses to be his betrothed.

With this beginning, the novel, divided into eight parts, tells the story of Ali in Canada and Zeynep in Turkey during the years of 1913 until late 1917. Their narratives form the separate parts of the novel beginning with Zeynep in Eyolmez, Anatolia in June of 1913. Still reeling from Ali's departure, Zeynep becomes determined to leave her village. Zeynep is not on good terms with Ali's mother who has complained to the dede about her. Zeynep's cousin, Fatma who is married to Ali's brother Yousef, has a baby girl along with a son named Suleyman. In December of 1913, the Turkish army takes Zeynep's brother, Turabi, along with Riza and Hassan. Early in 1914, Protestant missionaries arrive in Zeynep's village attempting to convert the Alevi Kurds to Christianity. When Zeynep tells the teacher, Miss Anton, who is from Toronto, Canada about wanting to come with her to Harput, Miss Anton flatly refuses because Zeynep will not convert to Christianity.

Zeynep decides to take matters into her own hands and when the missionaries leave for Harput she follows them on foot. She is eventually discovered and welcomed by Reverend John Emmonds and his wife, Lenore. Before arriving in Harput they stop in Mezreh, which is half Armenian and is headquarters for the Ottoman Army, where Zeynep helps them.  In Harput Zeynep finds the Emmonds home to be spacious and is puzzled by the many empty rooms. Zeynep meets Keghani an Armenian girl who lives with the Emmonds and Yester an Armenian woman who comes in to cook for them. Yester's husband, Onnig does various chores for the missionaries.

At first life is good; Zeynep and Keghani work at the hospital and then attend lectures at the college. They are well treated by the Emmonds. From her mother's letter she learns that the Turkish soldiers are raiding the villages and young men are being forced into the army.

By August, 1914, Zeynep hears that Austria, Germany and Serbia are at war with Russia. Since Germany and Turkey are allies it likely means Turkey will enter the war. When Zeynep learns that all men between the ages of twenty and forty-five must enlist or they will be hunted down she worries about Turabi. Quickly the situation escalates out of control. Armenian men trying to avoid the draft are imprisoned, the men are marched up and down the streets and are beaten, soldiers steal from the marketplace, and the women and children begin to starve. By September the soldiers, including the Armenian men and Turkish officers are marched out of  Harput through Zeynep's village of Eyolmez to Erzurum where there is fighting.

A month later, Fatma, Aunt Besse and Suleyman show up in Harput bearing a terrible story. When the Turkish soldiers came to Eyolmez they stole everything from both Armenian and Alevi alike. With the villages in the area all overrun by the Turkish soldiers, the people fled into the mountains. It was there that Fatma's baby died. Fatma tells Zeynep that there were no Armenian soldiers with the Turks, which puzzles her because she knows the Armenian men left with the Turkish army. Fatma also gives Zeynep a letter written to her by Ali.

Ali's narration begins in January of 1915 in Kapuskasing, Ontario.He is a prisoner of war having been sent to northern Ontario because in the eyes of the government he is from Turkey and therefore must be a Turk - an ally of Germany and therefore at war with Canada. This Ali cannot understand because he is an Alevi Kurd, one of the original inhabitants of Anatolia. The Canadians believe that anyone in Turkey who is not Christian must be Muslim.

When Ali first arrived in Canada he worked in the foundry in Brantford. But when the war started, all foreigners were fired and now without work Ali struggles to make ends meet. Both Ali and Yousef are arrested along with many other men, for allegedly trying to blow up the post office. Ali's landlord, Hagop Gregorian tries to reason with the police but he is told that they have orders from the government in Ottawa. First he is sent to Fort Henry in Kingston, Ontario and then to the wilderness of Kapuskasing where he is ordered to chop down trees to make bunkhouses for the prisoners.

What follows in alternating parts are the stories of Ali and Zeynep. Ali struggles to cope with the loneliness and hardship of the north and the sometimes brutal treatment by the guards. They are forced to cut down the beautiful huge trees which Ali feels is a terrible wrong.  The terrible conditions leads him to make a rash decision which almost results in severe consequences. Hearing about Turkey's involvement in the war, Ali is desperately worried about what has happened to Zeynep. Will he ever see her again?

Meanwhile, Zeynep can only watch as her country dissolves into the chaos of what eventually becomes the Armenian genocide. First she learns that the Turkish Army has killed all the Armenian men, and then that all Armenians are to be deported. Suspecting that this will be another massacre Zeynep seeks the help of the American Consulate, who encourages her to continue recording what is happening in Harput.  Zeynep cannot understand why the government is killing the Armenians.The Alevi's try to help the few Armenians left but they soon find themselves the focus of the next wave of ethnic cleansing by the Turks. Zeynep's only chance to escape may be through the Dersim Mountains and into Russia.

Discussion

Dance of the Banished is a beautifully crafted novel, from its gorgeous cover (a painting by Pascal Milelli) inviting readers into its pages, to the well-told story of two lovers separated by distance and war. Using alternating narratives, Skrypuch effectively presents the effects of war in two very different countries. In Harput, we experience the horror of the Armenian genocide through Zeynep's eyes as she struggles to understand what it happening.

People who had lived in this area for thousands of years were being rounded up and killed? I tried to set my emotions aside to make sense of it from the government's point of view. What was their purpose? Did they want all the businesses to grind to a halt and all the shops to close? What about the hospitals? Without the Armenians, who would run them? Killing the Armenians would even harm the Turks, so why were they doing this?"

When the magnitude of the killing becomes apparent to Zeynep she finds it incomprehensible.

"Mr. Davis estimates that a million and a half Armenians have been killed. Is that even possible? Each of those million and half people was a living, breathing human being like you or me."

From Zeynep we learn that the American Consul, Leslie Davis tried to get word out to the world via telegrams and photographs but these never got through. The American Consulate eventually hid hundreds of Armenians, men, women and children. Skrypuch is not overly graphic but she does managed to convey a sense of the brutality and the extent of the genocide through descriptions of the wounded, "the threadbare Armenians marched past Harput....to be marched in circles in the desert until they die." Especially tragic is Zeynep's encounter in the market

Skrypuch isn't afraid to identify those involved of the massacre when Zeynep sees a group of Turks and Muslim Kurds chanting "Praise be to Allah. Bless us in our efforts to kill the Christians." and she cannot understand the Kurds involvement since they themselves have been persecuted in Turkey.

Through Ali's eyes we see the ignorance of a predominantly British Canada, whose people and government don't understand other cultures who in war time, automatically violate basic human rights. Ali struggles to endure the poor rations, the bitter cold and his loss of freedom. Ali has a chance at freedom when Nadie offers him the opportunity to live with her people. But Ali recognizes that living such a different life has a price; abandoning who he is and failing to stand up for what he believes in.

Many young Canadians will find Ali's experience as a prisoner in Canada disturbing. Ali considered himself someone loyal to Canada, yet he was imprisoned solely because of his nationality and endured hard labour for several years. Unfortunately, this practice continued in the Second World War, with the internment of Canadians of Japanese and also of Italian heritage.

The author's extensive research on the Armenian genocide is evident in Dance of the Banished. Her development of the setting of the novel is realistic and her characters believable for this time period and for the Alevi culture she portrays so well. The title refers to the semah, a religious ritual dance between Alevi men and women that has a special spiritual significance. With the departure of Ali and the breakdown of society in Harput and Ali's incarceration, neither can perform this dance. When they are reunited, Zeynep and Ali feel whole again and are able to perform the semah.

There are two excellent maps included, on the back of the front and back covers. The first map is of  Anatolia, showing its location relative to Syria and Russia. The map at the back of the novel is of Kapuskasing, Ontario. The map illustrations were done by John Lightfoot and are very well done. My library copy obscured these maps by taping the cover flaps down. Also included are photographs of the Kapuskasing Internment Camp. The author also has an interesting note detailing her research and how she came to write the novel.

Dance of the Banished is an excellent piece of historical fiction and Marsha Forchuk Skyrpuch's best work to date. Definitely a future White Pine Award winner for this increasingly popular and talented Canadian children's author.

Book Details:
Dance of the Banished by Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch
Toronto: Pajama Press        2014
233 pp.