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ANKARA, March 31 (AFP) - A new novel
telling the tongue-in-cheek tale of how a group of
Turkish nationalists -- and some extra-terrestrial
friends -- invade the United States is targeting
best-seller lists in Turkey, in the midst of a boom
in anti-US books.
"America Is Ours" hits the bookshelves this weekend
with its cover depicting the Statue of Liberty
sporting a handlebar mustache -- the Turkish macho
symbol par excellence -- and the US flag's stars
replaced by the triple-crescent symbol of the
Turkish far-right.
The parody in political-fiction starts off with an
alien suddenly showing up as a young Turkish
nationalist says his prayers.
The spaceman grants the wish of the young Turk,
exasperated by US interventionism in the Middle East
and furious at the (fictional) secret crossing of
the Istanbul Bosphorus by two US warships, and helps
him invade America thanks to a machine that controls
people's minds.
The occupiers immediately bring things Turkish to
their new land, organising "cig kofte" (a spicy
Turkish delicacy made of raw hamburger) parties at
the White House, proclaiming Turkish the official
language and transforming Madonna into a belly
dancer.
"There is some anti-US sentiment at the bottom of
the book, but it's really not a war story because no
one gets killed," Erdogan Ekmekci, one of the two
co-authors of the book, told AFP.
It is the first novel by Ekmekci, a 27-year-old
Istanbul resident and a former sales representative.
"The circumstances are right for anti-US books," he
acknowledged, but stressed that "America Is Ours" is
more a work of "self-criticism" of Turkey's 70
million mainly Muslim citizens and their way of life
than it is an anti-US tract.
"The way we (the Turks) run the United States means
the end of the country, because we bring along all
our troubles and woes," he said, explaining his
book.
Among them: a bevy of social problems, such as huge
queues of patients waiting outside hospitals and an
economy crippled by mismanagement, where a loaf of
bread sells for 250 dollars.
"What we're doing is blaming the devil for our
sins," commented Ekmekci of his book, which comes
hot on the heels of another anti-US best-seller in
Turkey, the just as futuristic but more sobering
"Metal Storm", which relates the 2007 invasion of
Turkey by US forces.
"Metal Storm" is a confirmed best-seller, with more
than 110,000 sales since its December release,
riding a wave of strong anti-US sentiment in Turkey
sparked by the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
The invasion created real tensions between the
staunch NATO allies and anti-Americanism suddenly
became a saleable commodity in a country undergoing
an unprecedented surge of patriotism.
"The circumstances are right," echoed Adem Ozbay,
not concealing that his Akis publishing house, which
will release "America Is Ours" with a first run of
50,000, is hoping to get on the bandwagon.
But Ozbay told AFP he regretted that the current
display of flag-waving patriotism sparked by a
couple of Kurdish teen-agers trying to burn the
Turkish flag has "gone out of control" and been
transformed into "a show of jingoism".
"We tried to have a little fun by trying to imagine
what would happen in the United States if the
mistakes we make here were repeated there," he
explained.
It all ends badly in the book, to the point that the
hero has to once again resort to his
extra-terrestrial friends' powers to go back in time
and pretend none of it ever happened.
AFP
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