I am so confused about where this book falls on the spectrum of novel--memoir. It reads like a memoir that is based solely on childhood memory, impressions, and stories remembered and less on research (with family, with newspapers, etc) to find "the truth". Because, obviously, every person experiences their own truth--and childhood and long-ago truth can easily be distorted.

Stanisic was born in Yugoslavia (now Bosnia) and his family moved to Germany as refugees during the war in Yugoslavia. He is the narrator/main character of the book. In chapters of varying length he considers his childhood, what leaving did for and to his parents and grandparents. How they adjusted to Germany and how he did--they lost their careers and struggled with language, and he writes in German. Then his parents' being deported, his grandmother returning to Bosnia when she was deported (post-war). His fighting to get the paperwork to allow himself to stay in Germany--never considering, at the time, what his parents thought as they left for Florida. Much of the last half of the book his his grandmother's descent into dementia.

The overall tone of this book is wistfulness. Wondering who he and his parents might have been if there was no war, missing the camaraderie of his high school friends in Germany (from Yugo, Italy, Poland, Turkey, Germany). Missing his grandparents and the Bosnian traditions he never really learned; watching his grandmother deteriorate from afar. Interestingly, this book does not feel angry--this is not a book angry at the different factions in the former Yugoslavia or anger at people in Germany who mocked his name or accent (as so many North American immigration stories are). Rather it's an exploration of how it was and a recognition of his family's luck (his mother was warned by an acquaintance) and perhaps a touch of survivor's guilt. The little obvious anger in this book is focused on his grandmother's dementia.

The Choose-You-Own-Adventure bit at the end? Not for me, but I do wonder if Stanisic wrote that first, and then it morphed into the book. ( )

Ich habe mir schwer getan in das Buch reinzukommen, da es sehr abgehackt geschreiben ist und auch viel in der Zeit gesprungen wird. Hat man sich an den Stil gewöhnt ist das Buch sehr humorvoll und beschreibt das Leben und die Gefühle des Autors nachvollziehbar. Leider fande ich die Art des Endes schade, da es dem restlichen Buch meiner Meinung nach nicht würdig war. ( )

Ein interessantes Buch zum Thema Herkunft, aus Sicht eines bosnischen Geflohenen. Das letzte Kapitel verstört etwas, ansonsten ein guter Ansatz. ( )

Stanisic explica la seva fugida als 14 anys de l'antiga Iugoslàvia emigrant a Alemanya i recorda el seu sentiment cap a la seva àvia, família, amics, veïns... i sobretot al seu país abans de la guerra. Et transmet molt el sentiment de ser refugiat. ( )

Sašas Herkunft ist auch meine, und ich verstehe es vermutlich nochmal... nicht besser, aber anders, worüber er schreibt. Das Geniale ist: er schreibt so gut, dass es auch jeder verstehen, nachfühlen, und auch gut finden kann. ( )