The author talks about her nomadic childhood, being targeted by the Turkish government and overcoming depression to write her latest novel

For a long time Elif Shafak was referred to as Turkey’s “most widely read female author”. Today, she is surely simply its best loved. Orhan Pamuk may have won the Nobel prize in literature, but it is Shafak whose novels are fervently passed among readers. There Are Rivers in the Sky, which follows a single raindrop from ancient Nineveh to the River Tigris in 2018, was one of the UK’s bestselling literary novels last year. The Island of Missing Trees, a love story set in post-colonial Cyprus and contemporary London, was shortlisted for the Women’s prize in 2022, and 10 Minutes 38 seconds in This Strange World, narrated by a murdered sex worker in Istanbul, was shortlisted for the Booker prize in 2019. Last December she was elected president of the Royal Society of Literature. It would be tempting to say she is on a roll, but Shafak’s reputation and readership have been steadily growing for more than 20 years and spanning as many books, of which 14 are novels.

In a 2017 Ted Talk, which has been viewed more than 6.4m times, she describes herself as an Istanbulite, “a European by birth and by choice” and a Londoner for many years. “I like to think of myself as a global soul, as a world citizen, a nomad and an itinerant storyteller.” Her novels sweep confidently across centuries and continents, taking in politics, history, feminism and ecology, typically with a dash of magic realism or mysticism.

‘The climate issue is the security issue,’ says Turkish minister at Pacific pre-Cop summit in Fiji

Wealthy countries should spend far more on dealing with the climate crisis than the 5% of GDP promised by Nato members for defence because “the climate issue is the security issue”, the host of the next UN summit has said.

But, in comments that are likely to prove contentious, the Cop31 president-designate, Murat Kurum, hedged on whether countries should try to repeat a previous agreement to “transition away from fossil fuels” – the primary cause of the climate crisis – when they meet in Turkey next month.

Izmir mayor Cemil Tugay joins ruling AKP after vowing he would never switch sides in boost for Turkish president

The mayor of Izmir, Turkey’s third city and an opposition stronghold, has defected to the ruling AKP in a move hailed by Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the Turkish president.

Turkey’s opposition is battling an increasingly intense crackdown, with a barrage of what observers say are politically motivated arrests and lawsuits targeting its mayors and elected officials.