From An Armenian Community In New Jersey, To Confronting Armenian Taboos In Turkey

Meline Toumani left promising job at The New York Times and moved to Istanbul to try to understand Turkish life and culture. She grew up in a close-knit Armenian community in New Jersey where Turkish restaurants were shunned and products made in Turkey were boycotted. During the four years she spent in Turkey, she tried to talk about the Armenian genocide, finding her way into conversations that were taboo, and sometimes illegal. Her new book is There Was and There Was Not: A Journey Through Hate and Possibility in Turkey, Armenia, and Beyond.

There Was and There Was Not

(Courtesy of the publisher)