Archive
Reviews
Readings of books from the region and beyond.
Try a theme — e.g. memory, exile, language. Search by idea, not just by title.
Glasnik i Razdvajanje: The Instability of Reality
Dario Šarec's paired novels use fantasy elements — most notably black and white rabbits as archetypal symbols — to destabilize reality and suggest its stability was always an illusion. The review credits the short-sentence, cinematic style with strong readability, but faults occasional Hollywood clichés and overly explicit dialogue. Ultimately it finds the books work as engaging thrillers yet retreat into safe genre conventions rather than sustaining true literary disruption.
- Science fiction
- Contemporary fiction
Kao da nema sutra: An Intriguing Premise, a Lukewarm Execution
"Kao da nema sutra" is Borna Vujčić's novel about a virus that selectively kills people deemed immoral, narrated by a God figure conceived in feminist terms. The review finds the premise intriguing but the execution weak, faulting the narrative device as trivial and self-referential and the language as pedestrian. It argues the book leaves its central moral questions unexamined and closes on a facile, unconvincing resolution.
- Science fiction
- Contemporary fiction
Cimetna pisma, dijamantna stvorenja: A Love Story in Post-Apocalyptic Times
"Cimetna pisma, dijamantna stvorenja" is Faruk Šehić's ambitious, technically accomplished novel that uses a fragmented, non-linear structure to render a fractured reality through memory and association. The review admires its craft and its personification of war as a predatory character, while reading this as a sign the author cannot free himself from the burden of the past. It faults commonplace observations that undercut the book's philosophical ambition and wishes he would move beyond war narratives.
- Science fiction
- Poetry
- Post-Yugoslav literature
Do boljeg jučer: Many Possible Readings
A novel that uses a science-fiction, time-travel premise to explore post-war life in Sarajevo, where characters share a tendency to blame the war for their failures. The review reads it less as a book about war than about present-day burden, and questions the naive idea that killing Milošević could have prevented conflict. It finds the work underdeveloped on both the speculative and psychological levels, though open enough to invite many possible interpretations.
- Science fiction
- Contemporary fiction