Goodreads Monday is a weekly meme where we randomly select a book from our Good Reads To Be Read list and show it off. I got the idea from Danielle over at Books, Vertigo and Tea, who tags back to the host, Lauren’s Page Turners.  

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My Name is Red
by Orhan Pamuk
417 pages
Published 2002

From Goodreads: At once a fiendishly devious mystery, a beguiling love story, and a brilliant symposium on the power of art, My Name Is Red is a transporting tale set amid the splendor and religious intrigue of sixteenth-century Istanbul, from one of the most prominent contemporary Turkish writers.

The Sultan has commissioned a cadre of the most acclaimed artists in the land to create a great book celebrating the glories of his realm. Their task: to illuminate the work in the European style. But because figurative art can be deemed an affront to Islam, this commission is a dangerous proposition indeed. The ruling elite therefore mustn’t know the full scope or nature of the project, and panic erupts when one of the chosen miniaturists disappears. The only clue to the mystery–or crime? –lies in the half-finished illuminations themselves. Part fantasy and part philosophical puzzle, My Name is Red is a kaleidoscopic journey to the intersection of art, religion, love, sex and power.

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I first saw this book on one of Chip Kidd’s TED Talks about book cover design. He designed the cover to tell a story of mystery, romance, and danger- essentially, the story of the book as told by the art on the cover, which wraps around the full book (so you’re missing out on a lot of that story when you can only see the front cover). If you’re a fan of cover art, that dimensionality is something that eBooks lack.

The story is intriguing, too. It’s a period piece set in the 1500s (one of my favorite time periods) and involves art, as well as political and religious intrigues. What’s not to be intrigued about?

I’m looking forward to reading this one, and if I love it, I will definitely adding this beautiful book to my collection.