Fairy Chimney Soda

Dedicated to his father, Mevlüt, who made and sold his own brand of flavored soda or “Peri Gazozu” in a village in Anatolia, Fairy Chimney Soda is a collection of short stories by Turkish author, screenplay writer and actor, Ercan Kesal. He is clear-eyed as he mines his memories of childhood and his early years as a doctor fulfilling his mandatory civil service in the remote villages of Anatolia. He explores the wonder and terror of childhood, the hardship of living through the turbulent years in the lead-up to the 1980 military coup and the anguish, insight and resolution that comes with death and dying. [NP] These are cautionary tales unveiling hard truths, unsettling in their quick, dramatic shifts in mood, at times bleak and buckling under a philosophical pressure, at other times warm and uplifting, always rich with human wisdom. Matching with his presence on the silver screen, Kesal is a brave and bighearted writer: radical, self-questioning and perceptive