Istanbul, 1537. The greatest of the Ottoman Sultans is at his personal apogee and the pinnacle of world power. With both Christianity and Islam riven by schism, he is mighty enough to maul different enemies in different hemispheres at the same time. But a terrible crisis is building that will rip Suleyman's family apart as his beloved wife Hurrem wages pitiless war against his first-born son, Mustafa, and the boy's mother Mahidevran.

From the Baillie Gifford shortlisted historian, this intensely gripping, cinematic account of the life and world of Suleyman the Magnificent tells the story of one of the most consequential lives in world history while pioneering a ground-breaking new form of 'history in the present tense'.