Margins
The girl who didn't like her name book cover
The girl who didn't like her name
2014
First Published
3.56
Average Rating
154
Number of Pages

This is the tale of a creative, clever and curious girl from Istanbul who is full of brilliant ideas and projects. She has one problem, though. She hates her name. At school she is regularly ridiculed and bullied by her classmates, all because of her rather unusual name. Why have her parents named her after a ridiculous plant? Why not Rose or Violet or Daisy? Instead they have named her Pelargonium -a shrubby perennial plant that attracts hummingbirds. Being a lonely child books are her best friends. Whenever she feels troubled she seeks solace in books and stories. And one day in the school library she stumbles across a magical globe that will change her life. Thanks to the globe she will make friends with two unusual children, both of whom are coming from the 8th Continent, here on a mission to save their homeland. The 8th Continent is a breathtaking place unmarked on any maps. It imports imagination and exports stories to the world and is dependent on imagination to exist and to thrive. However, as less and less people are reading and imagination becomes a scarce commodity, the 8th Continent has started to dry up inside, its ecological balance forever disrupted. It's now up to Pelargonium and her new friends to save imagination and the 8th Continent.

Avg Rating
3.56
Number of Ratings
6,817
5 STARS
24%
4 STARS
28%
3 STARS
32%
2 STARS
12%
1 STARS
4%
goodreads

Author

Elif Shafak
Elif Shafak
Author · 21 books
Elif Shafak is an award-winning British-Turkish novelist and the most widely read female author in Turkey. She writes in both Turkish and English, and has published seventeen books, eleven of which are novels. Her work has been translated into fifty languages. Shafak holds a PhD in political science and she has taught at various universities in Turkey, the US and the UK, including St Anne's College, Oxford University, where she is an honorary fellow. She is a member of Weforum Global Agenda Council on Creative Economy and a founding member of ECFR (European Council on Foreign Relations). An advocate for women's rights, LGBT rights and freedom of speech, Shafak is an inspiring public speaker and twice a TED Global speaker, each time receiving a standing ovation. Shafak contributes to major publications around the world and she has been awarded the title of Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres. In 2017 she was chosen by Politico as one of the twelve people who would make the world better. She has judged numerous literary prizes and is chairing the Wellcome Prize 2019. www.elifshafak.com
548 Market St PMB 65688, San Francisco California 94104-5401 USA
© 2025 Paratext Inc. All rights reserved