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amjammi's review against another edition
2.0
well written but disturbing. why do i keep picking such morbid books?
michalhaman's review against another edition
5.0
Výborný vhľad do toho, čo sa udialo v Bosne a Hercegovine začiatkom 90tych rokov. Pútavo napísané, previazanie faktov a osobných príbehov v krátkom 100 stranovom diele.
knihosaurus_rex69's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
informative
reflective
fast-paced
4.25
martimartx's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
fast-paced
4.0
liralen's review
4.0
Thousands of news reports, feature articles, exhibitions, books, photo albums, and documentary and feature films have been produced on the war on Bosnia. But when the war ended (or, as some people think, was suspended for a while), the reporters packed up their cameras and headed off to other wars. (4)
The Bosnian War—and the genocide that was part of it—has been over for more than a quarter century, but if Like Eating a Stone isn't relevant today then I don't know what is.
DNA testing is something new in the history of war. So are body bags, computers, the Internet, computerized cold stores, forklift trucks, and trays on wheels. Apart from that, it has all happened before: prison camps, barracks, selections, ghettoes, hiding places, the sheltering of victims, armbands, piles of shoes left behind by victims of mass murder, hunger, looting, late-night knocks on doors, people disappearing from their homes, blood on the walls, the burning of farmsteads, burning barns with people inside, massacres of entire villages, besieged cities, human shields, the raping of women, mass executions, mass graves, mass exhumations, international tribunals, and people disappearing completely. (21)
Much of the book reads like fiction, with just enough distance and few enough details to make you forget, for a moment, that these are real people and real places and real terrors. It's not Tochman's story—he's Polish—but a collective one, an exploration of people's stories after the war.
Jasna is the only mother who survived the boiler house. The other mothers were luckier: they died along with their children. We don’t ask Jasna about her children, such as what they weighed when they were born; how long she breastfed them; whether they were clever, jolly, and well behaved; or about the size of the red rubber boots. (89)
Some of this is about the literal what happened—what violences and atrocities; who was murdered; who was raped; when and where and by whom. But much of it is about the after: the pain of looking, day after day, for answers about what happened to you loved ones; the continued search for bodies, even years later. It's about the ways the perpetrators and the victims view the war, and the way in which they view the 'other side', and the way in which they understand themselves as victims or perpetrators—the women who complain that the other side killed so many people, while their husbands hide indoors, away from journalists and cameras, afraid that someone from that 'other side' will recognise them, and they will be held accountable.
This isn't the book to read to understand what happened in Bosnia. It is a book to read to get a glimpse into the horror that is war and its aftermath, and—now—to think about what life will look like in Ukraine when the immediate crisis is over.
The Bosnian War—and the genocide that was part of it—has been over for more than a quarter century, but if Like Eating a Stone isn't relevant today then I don't know what is.
DNA testing is something new in the history of war. So are body bags, computers, the Internet, computerized cold stores, forklift trucks, and trays on wheels. Apart from that, it has all happened before: prison camps, barracks, selections, ghettoes, hiding places, the sheltering of victims, armbands, piles of shoes left behind by victims of mass murder, hunger, looting, late-night knocks on doors, people disappearing from their homes, blood on the walls, the burning of farmsteads, burning barns with people inside, massacres of entire villages, besieged cities, human shields, the raping of women, mass executions, mass graves, mass exhumations, international tribunals, and people disappearing completely. (21)
Much of the book reads like fiction, with just enough distance and few enough details to make you forget, for a moment, that these are real people and real places and real terrors. It's not Tochman's story—he's Polish—but a collective one, an exploration of people's stories after the war.
Jasna is the only mother who survived the boiler house. The other mothers were luckier: they died along with their children. We don’t ask Jasna about her children, such as what they weighed when they were born; how long she breastfed them; whether they were clever, jolly, and well behaved; or about the size of the red rubber boots. (89)
Some of this is about the literal what happened—what violences and atrocities; who was murdered; who was raped; when and where and by whom. But much of it is about the after: the pain of looking, day after day, for answers about what happened to you loved ones; the continued search for bodies, even years later. It's about the ways the perpetrators and the victims view the war, and the way in which they view the 'other side', and the way in which they understand themselves as victims or perpetrators—the women who complain that the other side killed so many people, while their husbands hide indoors, away from journalists and cameras, afraid that someone from that 'other side' will recognise them, and they will be held accountable.
This isn't the book to read to understand what happened in Bosnia. It is a book to read to get a glimpse into the horror that is war and its aftermath, and—now—to think about what life will look like in Ukraine when the immediate crisis is over.