NO BALLYHOO
NO BALLYHOO… a novel about a jewish muslim friendship surrounded by an international cast of wonderful and wacky characters in search of that one true universal love… the human heart itself…
No Ballyhoo by Canadian-Italian-Turkish novelist Mauro Mevlud Martino is a kaleidoscopic look at New York life from the perspective of three generations in the Big Apple starting from the early 1900s to modern day. The novel is a microscopic look into the Polish-Jewish Cohen family beginning with Leonard Schwartz Cohen who had a prized pickling business from which he sold his famous dills from street carts of Krakow, Poland and later in Brooklyn, NY. Leonard's pickles sewed the seeds of the great Cohen family history and a gilded jar is kept on the home mantelpiece like a praiseworthy Academy Award, a reminder of the long Cohen dill pickling legacy.
From philosophic world views in references to Jung and Freud to religious beliefs - Muslim, Christian, Jewish, Buddhist, even atheist; from the exotic and traditional dishes of Istanbul, Poland, Italy, India, Africa mixed with the New World eclectic flavors of America and Canada; from the drumming of African percussions, American jazz, Turkish pipes, Polish waltzes and everything else that echoes into John's cafe from the bowels of the Martini-Cohen retro music store Last Year's Music to the grand silences and gaps of expressionless emotion that a great love renders when it happens; here between Kirk Cohen and his Turkish love interest Hesychia Mancuso; from holy books to canonic literature; from salt Kosher dishes to sweet honeyed treats of Turkey... No Ballyhoo is A Moveable Feast.
- by Vanessa McMahon (author, filmmaker and producer)
A marvellous book that carries us through a vecu, a very sensitive journey illuminated in nostalgic New York, where cultures melt into the spicy tastes and flavours of… There are authors, who write novels, which could be turned into movies, but readers have usually celebrated those authors, with highest recognition and respect who write novels, with such an imaginary impact which transmits all your sensus of reality to a “transcendent” instance of the real world: a “projector”, illuminating into the Reader’s Self, the brilliant coloré cinemascope movie of its own.
-Sam Vaseghi, publisher... Wisehouse Publishing
"A modern and intelligent fairy tale set into a muti - ethical and multi religious New York City in the prospective of different generations. Full of humour and kindness, the reader can enjoy one gentle love story between a young Jew and a Muslim that grow day after the day in the streets of the ‘unofficial’ capital of the modern world. Martino’s writing demonstrates a forward looking mind that plays both with imagination and philosophy talking about serious matters as faith and hope, as well about rock music and food. It reminds the Haruki Murakami’s work in the sense of the solid confrontation among different cultures united by a deep sense of humanity and friendship. A book to dream and laugh, but also to think about meaning of existence told trough intense dialogues. Nice as a glass of cold sparkling white wine you drink in sunny summer day, warm as the red wine you share with the woman of you life."
– Marco Spagnoli (Critic, Journalist and Filmaker)
This review is from: No Ballyhoo (Paperback)
if you want to journey through the internal labyrinth of your inner being where the inheritance of race, culture and blood ties meet with sociology, philosophy, psychology and the quest for love... if you are looking to merge all of this into a spiritual understanding, then 'no ballyhoo' by mauro mevlud martino is the right vehicle to board and continue with your journey...
