Introduction

Istanbul, 1565. A cracked clock. A dead Venetian. A secret that could bring down an empire. When young Jewish artisan Yusuf Mizrahi pockets a broken Venetian clock from a dead merchant's stall in the Grand Bazaar, he has no idea what he has stolen. But the clock is still ticking and its rhythm is wrong in a way that no accident could explain.

Yusuf's Apprenticeship

Apprenticed to Usta Kerem, Istanbul's most brilliant and most guarded clockmaker, Yusuf is drawn into the glittering, dangerous world of the Topkapı Palace workshops. There, a Sultan's obsession with a magnificent new clock intersects with a centuries-old intelligence war between the Ottoman Empire and Venice.

The Hidden Message

Inside the clock Yusuf is building, he hides a decoded message that names a traitor at the heart of the empire. Inside his mentor's locked room, an unfinished masterwork holds a secret older than any of them. And watching him from behind a carved palace lattice is Dilara, a woman who is not what she appears, who knows far more than she has told him, and whose time in Istanbul is running out.

The Themes

A story of craft, cipher, and impossible loyalty, The Ottoman Clockmaker brings sixteenth-century Istanbul to vivid, intricate life. For readers of Elif Şafak, Jessie Burton, and Carlos Ruiz Zafón, a novel that proves the most dangerous mechanisms are the ones that keep secrets.