Mediterranean Waltz - Buket Uzuner

It is late 1990ies in Istanbul.Duna, a young Istanbulian highschool teacher, wakes up one morning to the sound of fighter jets, later to find a group of soldiers at his door.

A civil war has erupted and the country is being mobilized. Thus begins Duna's journey to an uncertain future.

Meanwhile, during Duna's absence from his neighborhood Kuzguncuk, a small village by the shores of Bosphorus that has long been a melting pot for Jewish, Armenian, Greek and Turkish communities, a mysterious accident occurs.

A love triangle that Duna had been involved in since childhood is shattered.

Mediterranean Waltz explores the painful similarities between civil wars and wars inside a participant's mind, while on the other hand, questions the delicate details of love-sex and desire-passion through a romantic triangle.Mediterranean Waltz is the bestselling novel of Buket Uzuner, one of the most prominent and acclaimed writers of contemporary Turkish Literature.

Her work has been translated in four languages and won The Novel Prize of Istanbul University in 1998.

"Mediterranean Waltz is the story of love in a time of upheaval by the magical Turkish writer Buket Uzuner."
- Yediot Ahranot, Israel 2002

"Mediterranean Waltz is an anti-war novel by the contemporary Turkish writer Buket Uzuner, set against a background that reveals many cultural aspects about our neighboring country."
- Kathimerini, Greece 2002