Prior to break, we read a book called the Janissary Tree. It told the story of a stream of murders through the Ottoman Empire. Investigator Yashim was set to figure out these murders. It is discovered that they were done by the Janissaries during the Janissaries' revolt against the Ottoman Empire.
The Auspicious Incident is what the novel was based on when Sultan Mahmud II was in power and made changes throughout the empire. His major change was to destry the janissaries for they were no longer protecting the people of the Ottoman Empire but causing chaos. Mamud II created a new army that was fashioned after the Europeans and ambushed the Janissaries which led to their downfall. After this time, some of the Janissaries that survived went into hiding and were forced to live te life of the rest of the people in order to simply survive.
This novel was written through the eyes of a historian who traveled the lands of the Middle East. He knew what the lands were and te customs of the people. His experiences made is novel more realistic feeling with accuret descriptions of how the people of the Ottoman Empire lived and the positions of the Janissaries and eunuchs which was what Investigator Yashim was.
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Although the novel was written by a well educated historian, I was not too thrilled with the book. It was interesting how related it was to the actual events that were occuring in the Ottoman Empire, but I thought that the author was too wordy. This made the storyline difficult to follow at times because there were so many different scenes going on. Although I did not particularly enjoy the book, I still think it was a good representation of the issues going on in the Ottoman Empire that led to its eventual downfall.
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