Surviving the Armenian genocide of 1915, Shnorik grows up in Istanbul mostly alone, and mostly alone, raises her daughter Meline who, struggling to navigate her Armenian identity in a hostile Turkish society, eventually leaves for America. There, Meline starts a new life only to once again encounter personal loss while raising Niko and his sister and navigating the complexities of her identity in post 9/11 America. Along the way, Shnorik and Meline nurture Niko’s love of music which he ultimately uses to explore the power of memory, love, and perseverance to create meaning in a fragmented world.

“Niko Michalopoulos’s memoir, Six then Five, is his story and his family’s story. But it is our story, too....It is, in many ways, a quintessentially American story, a story of forgetting and remembrance. Indeed, Michalopoulos calls on us to remember, and in a world in which we have too often forgotten the lessons of past pogroms and genocides and allowed them to reoccur, we cannot afford to keep forgetting.” ~ THEODORE RICHARDS, AUTHOR OF WHAT HAPPENED TO ICARUS

“Six Then Five is a deeply sincere, affecting portrait of three generations in his Armenian family across the century-long echo of the Armenian genocide in Turkey." ~ MELINE TOUMANI, AUTHOR OF THERE WAS AND THERE WAS NOT: A JOURNEY THROUGH HATE AND POSSIBILITY IN TURKEY, ARMENIA AND BEYOND

AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY

Niko Michalopoulos is a composer, pianist, writer and educator. Six then Five - An Armenian  Diaspora Story is his literary debut. The son of Armenian and Greek immigrants, his connection to his ancestral past is both fully alive and simultaneously fragmented. He is a specialist in Middle Eastern history and literature and consults with organizations interested in facilitating honest, open dialogue about challenging topics. He is a proud father of two children and three dogs and resides with them and his partner in Silver Spring, MD.