Black Rock White City by A.S. Patrić

October 2, 2019 by Christina

Fiction – Kindle edition. Transit Lounge, 2015. 157 pgs. Purchased. Yugoslavian refugees, Jovan and Suzan Brakochevich, resettled in the suburbs of Melbourne after their two young children died in a UN refugee camp during the Balkan War. Both husband and wife blame each other – Suzan didn’t eat the poisoned food so perhaps she knew; Jovan didn’t leave Sarajevo when Suzan wanted them to – and themselves for the death of their children, leaving their marriage on shaky ground as […]

Categories: 2019 Reads, Awards and Prizes, Balkans, Europe, Fiction, Genocide, Oceania • Tags: A.S. Patrić

Fascism by Madeleine K. Albright

March 15, 2019 by Christina

Nonfiction – Kindle edition. Harper Perennial, 2019. Originally published 2018. 320 pgs. Library copy. In the conclusion of her book, Albright says that some may find the title of her book to be alarmist, but it is her belief that we are living in an alarming time. Her assertion holds gravitas because of her credentials – she served as the United States Secretary of State and the Ambassador to the United Nations from 1993 to 2001 – and her personal […]

Categories: 2019 Reads, Asia, Balkans, Europe, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Nonfiction, North America, Poland, Russia, South America, United States • Tags: Madeleine K. Albright

The Cellist of Sarajevo by Steven Galloway

March 7, 2016 by Christina

Fiction — audiobook. Read by Gareth Armstrong. Naxos Audiobooks, 2010. Originally published 2008. 5 hours, 23 minutes. Library copy. Set at the beginning of what would become a nearly four-year long siege of the city, four individuals are attempting to navigate the complex jungle that Sarajevo has become. A man named Kenan has left his wife and child to collect water from a clean, working source on the other side of the city while another man, Dragan, has left the safety […]

Categories: 2016 Reads, Audiobook, Balkans, Book Club, Europe, Fiction, Giller Prize • Tags: Gareth Armstrong, Steven Galloway

The Bone Woman by Clea Koff

December 11, 2015 by Christina

Nonfiction — print. Random House, 2005. Originally published 2001. 304 pgs. PaperBackSwap. In order to prosecute perpetrators for genocide and crimes against humanity, bodies must be exhumed and their condition as well as the mass graves they are found in must be documented. It is not enough to say people of particular ethnic or religious groups have disappeared and are presumed dead as perpetrators can claim these missing individuals were casualties of war or are undocumented refugees in neighboring lands. […]

Categories: 2015 Reads, Africa, Balkans, Europe, Genocide, Nonfiction • Tags: Clea Koff

Fatherland by Nina Bunjevac

April 23, 2015 by Christina

Nonfiction – print. Liveright Publishing, 2015. 160 pgs. Library copy. In 1975, Bunjevac’s mother, Sally, flees to her birthplace of Yugoslavia with toddler Nina and Nina’s older sister, Sarah, in order to escape her abusive marriage. Her husband, Peter, assumes that demanding Sally leave their eldest child, Petey, behind with him will force Bunjevac’s mother to return with the girls, but Nina ends up staying in Yugoslavia until her father and two of his friends accidentally blow themselves up. Only […]

Categories: 2015 Reads, Balkans, Comics, Europe, Nonfiction • Tags: Nina Bunjevac

Journalism by Joe Sacco

December 27, 2014 by Christina

Nonfiction — print. Metropolitan Books, 2012. 192 pgs. Library copy. This collection of short-form comics produced by Sacco for various journalist enterprises reports from conflict zones around the world — Gaza, Chechnya, Iraq — and as well as from areas trying to reconcile with the aftermath of those conflicts — migration from war torn African nations to Malta, the war tribunals for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague, poverty amongst the Dalits (“untouchables”) in India. At the end of reprinted […]

Categories: 2014 Reads, Asia, Balkans, Comics, Europe, Genocide, India, Israel/Palestine, Middle East, Nonfiction, Russia • Tags: Joe Sacco

The Fixer by Joe Sacco

December 11, 2014 by Christina

Nonfiction — print. Drawn and Quarterly, 2003. 140 pgs. Library copy. During his coverage of the Bosnian genocide and the Balkan conflict, Sacco worked with a rather shady character known as a “fixer” – someone who can assist foreign journalists with gaining access to the front-lines of the conflict, the warlords and gangs running the countryside as the nation is torn apart, and victims to provide stories to color the news articles being written about the region. Sacco’s “fixer”, known […]

Categories: 2014 Reads, Balkans, Comics, Europe, Genocide, Nonfiction • Tags: Joe Sacco

Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie

August 24, 2014 by Christina

Fiction — print. Berkley, 2004. First published 1934. 322 pgs. Library copy. The tenth book in Christie’s series starring the private detective Hercule Poirot crisscrossing the “Orient” from Baghdad to Beirut to Istanbul before a snowdrift stops the train in its tracks in the now former Yugoslavia just after midnight. The passengers, including Poirot, are anxious to reach their destinations and disembark the crowded train yet the train is stopped once more with the discovery of an American passenger laying inside his […]

Categories: 2014 Reads, Balkans, Classics, Classics Club, Crime, Europe, Fiction, Middle East • Tags: Agatha Christie

The Whistleblower by Kathryn Bolkovac with Cari Lynn

March 6, 2013 by Christina

Nonfiction — print. Palgrave MacMillan, 2011. 240 pgs. Received from PaperBackSwap. Subtitled “Sex Trafficking, Military Contractors, and One Woman’s Fight For Justice”, Bolkovac explains how she went from being a Nebraska police officer to an investigator of gender-based violence, sex trafficking, and human rights violations in war-torn Bosnia. In the course of her investigations, however, Bolkovac found that some of her fellow peace-keepers were involved in human trafficking and forced prostitution. Yet her efforts to prosecute these people were stymied […]

Categories: 2013 Reads, Balkans, Europe, Genocide, Nonfiction • Tags: Cari Lynn, Kathryn Bolkovac

Logavina Street by Barbara Demick

August 22, 2012 by Christina

Nonfiction — print. Spiegel & Grau, 2012. 232 pgs. Review copy. Subtitled “Life and Death in a Sarajevo Neighborhood”, Demick tells the story of the Bosnian War and the brutal and devastating three and a half year siege of Sarajevo through the lives of ordinary citizens, who struggle with hunger, poverty, sniper fire, and shelling, living on Logavina Street. This six block long street serves as a microcosm of Sarajevo, a city that for four centuries was known for its […]

Categories: 2012 Reads, Balkans, Europe, Genocide, Nonfiction • Tags: Barbara Demick

The Key to My Neighbor’s House by Elizabeth Neuffer

September 29, 2011 by Christina

Nonfiction — print. Picador, 2002. Originally published 2001. 502 pgs. Borrowed from a friend. Subtitled “Seeking Justice in Bosnia and Rwanda,” Neuffer’s book is compilation of wartime reporting and personal recollections.  It’s also an impressive example of the incompetence, cowardice, and trepidation of the United Nations, NATO, and the Western world. For example, Neuffer states that the Dutch UN battalion’s failure to prevent the massacre of Srebrenica, a so-called “safe area” under UN protection, has become the Netherlands’ longest-running public […]

Categories: 2011 Reads, Africa, Balkans, Chunkster, Europe, Genocide, Nonfiction • Tags: Elizabeth Neuffer