Cloud Cuckoo Land is an enjoyable and profound reflection on preserving what is valuable and the unlikely combination of chance events that might make that possible. It also focuses on the way love preserves that value. The novel has a complex intertwining set of narratives of the stories of 5 main characters spread over wide historical and geographical settings, such as around the fall of Constantinople to the Turks in the mid 15th century, 20th and 21st century Idaho, the fields of the Korean War, aboard an inter-generational space ship enroute to a "second earth" in mid-21st century. All of these at first seemingly disconnected narratives gradually converge to tell a story of preservation that is centered on a "lost" ancient Greek comedy entitled "Cloud Cuckoo Land". The novel itself is much more interesting than what my above comments suggest, not in the least because of the often beautiful writing that situates us as readers at each of these narrative spaces and connects us to the memorable characters.
For a review of the novel by The Guardian, click here: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/sep/24/cloud-cuckoo-land-by-anthony-doerr-review-a-joyous-epic-of-love-and-survival
