The Ash Tree

Fiction. Armenian Studies. California Interest. Middle Eastern Studies. THE ASH TREE by Daniel Melnick tells a timeless story of the romance and marriage between an American Armenian girl and her immigrant husband who survived the 1915 Armenian Genocide in Turkey. In the aftermath of the Genocide from the twenties to the early seventies, the couple and their three children become vivid, quintessentially American characters, only for tragedy to find them again. Its cover painting with its frayed and white-washed frame is by the author’s wife, Jeanette Melnick. Combining history and fictionalized memoir, THE ASH TREE is an important, beautifully written novel of survival, new life, and heartbreak.