No Miniature This! 
 My Name Is Red is a huge and densely-composed novel set in late-16th-century Istanbul among the small closed circle of miniature painters, who work their whole lives until (and even after) they go blind, illustrating books which may never been seen again by any other than their rich patrons. Though clearly a masterpiece, it is by no means an easy read. 
 I came to this after reading Pamuk's later novel, Snow. What the two have in common is a concern with Islam and an examination of its place in a secularized world; they also share a large scale and a certain sense of fantasy. But whereas Snow is set in the modern world (albeit a distant outpost of it) and is told from a single perspective, My Name Is Red takes the reader back to 1591 and proceeds in a kaleidoscope of short chapters written by different characters in the story--including Satan, a corpse, a dog, a tree, and (as in the title) a pot of red ink! Even the covers of the two books show their differences: Snow almost monochromatic, My Name Is Red a collage of brilliantly colored panels and borders from miniatures such as those described in the book. The color, lightness, and even sense of fun draw the reader easily into the book until he is either held or repelled by the intensity of its philosophical argument. 
 There are two main plot strands: the mystery of a master miniaturist murdered by one of his colleagues, and a love story. The latter, actually, is not dissimilar to the situation in Snow: an exile returning after many years, hoping to be reunited with a former sweetheart who has since married another man. But, as in much medieval and renaissance literature, the point is less the story than the many digressions within the story: lists, legends, historical precedents, parables and counterparables, and above all disquisitions on the nature and purpose of figurative art within a culture whose religion forbids it. Pamuk's handling of these sections is virtuosic, and they become the verbal equivalent of the miniatures and decorations in an illuminated manuscript, and the main reason why one opens the book. 
 I would have to say that Pamuk does not seem to put much emphasis on the delineation of character, or perhaps that he is not always successful at it. The major figures in the love story come over quite clearly: the writer Black, his beloved Shekure, her children Shevket and Orhan, and (to a lesser extent) her father Enishte. But the miniaturists--nicknamed Olive, Butterfly, and Stork--one of whom must be the murderer, are distinguished more by subtle differences in their attitude to their art than by qualities of character. So the reader has little alternative but to go along with the author in solving the mystery more as a theorem in aesthetics and religion than as an outcome of human nature. 
 The book's color and brilliance of linguistic invention reminds me a little of Salman Rushdie, though Pamuk is a much cooler writer. But the closest parallel that comes to mind (although it is a long time since I read the book) is Umberto Eco's 
 The Name of the Rose 
 --another murder mystery used to frame historical, religious, and philosophical disquisitions in the old manner. Readers who enjoyed Eco should certainly try Pamuk.