Review of Gendarme

The Gendarme by Mark Mustian

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Very different and very deep. Hard to tell what is real and what is a dream of the past. Either way it doesn't matter. It deals with the Turkish removal of the Armenians during WW1 (the Armenian genocide), but puts a human face to both sides.



In the story of the past, a young Turkish soldier is ordered to escort a group of Armenians into Syria. Along the way he comes to love and want to protect a very bright-eyed Armenian girl. This story seems like a dream, and is juxtraposed against the main character who is about 90 years old and lives in the US. He has a brain tumor, and has not remembered his past from WW1 at all. However, he keeps dreaming about this march which he is part of, and begins to wonder if it actually happened. Even near the end, we are uncertain what is real and what is a dream. A bit heavy in places, and a bit surreal, but also very entertaining and intriguing, and somewhat believable with that backdrop.



If you don't know much about this part of history, it might be worth a read. I certainly learned a great deal....I guess you could say I'm a historical fiction fan. And it has led me to read another book on the subject from a more modern perspective -- The Bastard of Istanbul. They are very different, and I think this one is more readable as an introduction to what happened and to an understanding of the suffering of the Armenians.



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