BOOK REVIEW

Meet me in Istanbul was written by Richard Chisholm. It is an adventure thriller set in Turkey, and I´ve chosen it because I like this kind of books.

The book tells the story of Tom Smith’s journey, a British man who goes on holiday to Istambul to visit his fiancée, Angela, who is working there. But the journey is more complicated than he expects, some strange things will happen…

The story of Tom Smith begins at Heathrow airport while he is waiting for his plane. He is leaving for Istanbul to visit his fiancée, Angela Thomson, who works there for a small import/export company, which is starting to export things like brass ornaments, coffee-pots, trays leather or onyx articles to England. Looking forward to see his fiancée again, he sits down on a chair by the window. After several minutes, the plane takes off and they fly above London. When he is reading a letter that his fiancée sent to him, a sudden voice asks him if he has ever been to Istanbul. The man's name is Kemal and he lives in Istanbul, in Sisli. After a while talking, the plane lands in Istanbul and they have to go. Kemal gives his telephone number to Tom. If Tom needs anything, he can always call Kemal. They both go their own way, Tom to the place where he hopes to see Angela, his fiancée, and Kemal goes back home.

Tom takes a bus to the Park Hotel, in Taksim Square, and while the bus is waiting for a traffic light, a car stops beside the bus. Two men and a woman get out, and he realises that one of them is Angela. But before Tom can get out of the bus, the light is green and the bus drives away. He goes to the American Bar and waits for Angela to come, but after a while, she still hasn´t arrived there. Tom is getting worried but he waits a little bit longer, just in case. Three hours later, Tom goes away, but what he doesn’t know is that a man in a grey raincoat is following him, wherever he goes.

At first, Tom goes to Angela’s home, but she isn’t there. He knocks on the windows, on the door, but nobodyopens. He realises that Angela isn’t there. The first thoughts that come to his mind are that he needs a bath and a good sleep, and then he can decide what to do. First, he wants to stay at the Park Hotel, but it’s too expensive. He remembers seeing two small hotels not very far from the Park Hotel, so he walks to them and he arrives at the Ankara Hotel.

The next morning, Tom feels much better and he goes to Angela’s work to see if he can find her there. Her boss, Ibrahim Dünya, tells him that Angela was killed in a car accident a week ago, she was driving along a dangerous road and she got off the road. He doesn’t believe it at first, but after a while he feels a horrible pain. When he is outside again, he calls Kemal, who believes Tom when he says that he saw Angela the day before. First, they decide to go to the place where he saw her and after that, they go to the British Consulate in Istanbul. But also there, David Pennington, the man who made the arrangements for the funeral, tells him that Angela is dead and he advises him to go back to London.

When Tom is with Kemal again, Tom tells him the whole story and he has plans to leave Istanbul, but Kemal wants Tom to think carefully before he wants to make decisions. They go to the Topkapi Palace’s gardens to think and relax. When they start walking again, Kemal finds out that a man is following them, so he says to Tom to not look back and walk quickly. They go into the treasure rooms where it is very busy, they split up so the man can’t find them back, and they decide to phone each other in evening.

When Tom is back in his hotel, he receives a phone call from one of Angela’s friends, Julie, and she wants to meet him at the American bar in the Park Hotel. Tom wants to tell Kemal about it but when he tries to call him the phone gives no answer. He goes to the Park Hotel to meet Angela’s friend, and as soon as he meets her, Julie tells him everything she knows about the strange things that happened some time before: Angela enjoyed her work, but after a while she was behaving a bit strangely. While they are having lunch, Dünya comes in, and she thinks that Dünya has something to do with Angela’s disappearance because Angela looked as if she was scared of him. That’s why Julie wants to meet him. Tom tells her what he saw and he decides to search Angela now he thinks that she is still alive but she is in trouble.

The next day, Tom meet Kemal and they make up a plan to get rid of the guy who was following him, because they know now that he is a man of Dünya. Tom goes to Dünya’s office and says he is going to leave Istanbul. Then, Tom goes to the airport knowing the man in the grey raincoat is following him, and he checks in. In front of the entrance of the gate of the airplane, there is a crowd and the man loses sight of Tom, so Tom hides in the toilets. After the plane takes off, the man thinks Tom is on the plane, so he is coming back to London. After a while, Tom gets out of the toilets and takes a taxi to Kemal's flat in Sisli, and they decide to follow Dünya from his office to his home and try to find out what happened to Angela. Tom puts on a wig and a fake moustache, to make sure that Dünya doesn´t recognise him.

When they are at Dünya’s villa, they decide that Angela must be worried about something on her work, so they must search trough Dünya’s private office. Kemal thinks a plan: Dünya exports onyx ornaments and his parents sell things like that in their shop, so he can sell him a box full of ornaments very cheaply and he can get inside Dünya’s store. There, he checks the store out and notices a low wall in the courtyard. Kemal and Tom drive back to the hotel, and they decide to break in the courtyard.

That evening when it is dark, they go to Dunya’s office again to see what is happening there. They go to the alley where the wall was, they climb on it and they find out that Dunya is a drug dealer and a smuggler. But suddenly, Tom put his foot on a stone and slips. He puts out his hand and knocks against a piece of wood, which falls to the ground with a loud crash. The men in the office hear it, so they try to get away but it is too late and a few seconds later they are caught. Dünya is inside the workshop with a gun and he says Angela is in his villa as a guest. Tom and Kemal are taken away by Dünya and his men, and they arrive at Dunya’s villa. The men want to take them into the house but suddenly, the police arrive and Dünya and his men are caught. A few seconds later, the door opens and Angela runs out in Tom’s arms. She is fine, nothing very serious happened to her, she is just a little bit upset but that is normal.

Later that night, everything is ok again and Tom, Kemal and Angela go to Mr. Pennington’s flat in the Consulate building and they talk about what happened. Tom and Angela thank Kemal for his help, and finally, they are back together and they are going to have a holiday.

In my opinion, it’s a nice book to read because it’s interesting, entertaining and easy to read.

SHEILA DÍAZ RODRIGUEZ NI2

February,17th

NI2

Homework: Workbook:p.36,37,38,39.Grammar, unit 17 (have,have got)

Grammar : a photocopy to practice in pair the structure "I wish"

Vocabulary: Section 4C "A Question of Taste" St.B.p.60 and Vocabulary Bank, St.B-p. 153, all about furniture and adjectives to describe the different rooms of a houseeg. cosy, practical,comfortable...Test your partner all these words.

Listening: "Women working in a man´s world" . I´m not very good at tackling with audio programmes yet and the quality was awful, so we put off this activity.

Homework: grammar, units 113,114,115 about linking words you shouls already know.

February, 18th

NB2

Speaking: Speaking exam with photos to describe, compare them and relate them to your own experience.

After that I gave you the exams you had made the week before, checked the mistakes and solved doubts.

Grammar: Check grammar ,unit 85. Grammar, unit 86 about adjectives and adverbs and their differences . Then I went on to explain the comparative and superlative adjectives.

Homework: Grammar ,units 86,87,88.

NI2

Speaking: Speaking exam with photos to be described ,compared and related to personal experience.

then I gave you the exams you had made the week before and soved doubts, mainly in compositions.

Vocabulary: Review of vocabulary related to furniture on St.B-p.153

Listening: "women working in a man´s world"and this time the recording in spite of its difficulty was clear. a true-false activity.

Homework: Reading,St.b.p.63 , section B. Grammar units 68,69 (countable and uncountable nouns)