The Carpet Weaver of Usak is a different kind of love story. This one is about the friendship between two women in Anatolia – one a Turkish Muslim, the other a Greek Orthodox. Set in the Ottoman Empire of 1914, the novel describes the bond between these two women. Both women are rug weavers in Oushak – one of the great centers of Turkish rug making, where Greeks and Turks have long worked together to create spectacular woven masterpieces. Now Greece and Turkey confront an inevitable war, the art the women share helps both literally and figuratively to weave their lives – and their hearts – together.