By Angie Peterson
Carol Edgarian wrote this book brilliantly. She starts the book in Armenia in 1915. The novel tells about a little girl, Garod, living through the Turkish massacre. The Turks killed her father and baby brother, and marched her and her mother through the desert to the Euphrates River. Garod’s mother drowns herself in the river, and Garod lets go of her hand. She somehow makes it to France and there she loses her name and is given a new one, Casard. As she grows older and becomes a wife and a mother, she struggles with the sadness and guilt. Casard gives her first granddaughter her mothers name, Seta, hoping it will relieve some of the pain, and she will somehow be forgiven for abandoning her mother.
Seta has her own struggles, she is half Armenian and half Odar (not Armenian). Casard doesn’t like this, and Seta feels the resentment. Her parents divorce and she is confused through the whole book.
Rise the Euphrates is incredibly moving. It’s very serious, but most men wouldn’t like it or understand it. I think that it’s best to read it if you are a woman, especially an Armenian woman, then everything will make sense.