Trebincevic Kenan - The Bosnia list : a memoir of war, exile, and return

Praise for
THE BOSNIA LIST

A young New Yorker haunted by searing memories goes on a most unusual overseas vacationnot to sightsee or party but to confront the ordinary men and women who tore his familys lives apart. His journey takes us into a time of mesmerizing violence and betrayal when neighbors set upon each other as though it were the 1940s all over againa world of twisted emotions and baffling brutality lying just below the surface of hip contemporary Europe. The Bosnia List is powerful, the flashbacks riveting.

Tom Reiss, Pulitzer Prizewinning author of The Black Count

With understated elegance and in highly personal pointillist dots, Kenan Trebincevic illuminates how the Bosnian tragedy blighted, and continues to blight, the lives of countless people both in his homeland and in its far-flung diaspora. This important and original work reminds us, in ways large and small, of the long half-life of an atrocity.

David Margolick, author of Elizabeth and Hazel and Strange Fruit

Kenan Trebincevic fights against the power of memory and his own rage in this remembrance of a time that seems like a medieval anachronism yet was barely a decade ago. This is a searing memoir of war and peace from a young man who sees through ancient rhetoric with stunning clarity, in both his home country and his adopted United States. Read this book for its impassioned honesty.

Tom Zoellner, author of A Safeway in Arizona and coauthor of An Ordinary Man

Im so blown away by this beautiful book. For the first time, a young Bosnian tells a riveting coming-of-age story about the brutal Balkan War when parents disappeared into concentration camps, teachers turned on students, and children betrayed children. Two decades later, now an American citizen, Kenan returns to his homeland to confront the guilty and honor the dead in this passionate, nuanced account of a man who refuses to forget.

Julia Lieblich, human rights journalist and author of Sisters and coauthor of Wounded I Am More Awake

Kenan Trebincevics story of survival and remembrance is moving, well told, and important for all of us to hear. He makes a powerful case for courage and human decency as the only way through the divisive madness of modern life.

Ian Frazier, author of Travels in Siberia and Great Plains

A harrowing and heart-rending journey. Its a graceful, taut memoir of family, friends, and faith: a moving recollection of souls being torn asunder and slowly beginning to heal.

Laurence Bergreen, author of Columbus and Marco Polo

A mesmerizing tale of survival and healing.

Booklist

The Bosnia List was difficult to finish because it touched me so deeply. Most powerful was how Kenans mothers voice echoed in his head and became his morality, preventing him from getting revenge. Shes one of the strongest, best-described female characters in Bosnian literature. And I was rooting for Kenans father not to succumb to evil and stay a good man. That might be why his family survived. That shows us all: if we stay good, we have a chance.

Dr. Esad Boskailo, psychiatrist, Bosnian war survivor, and coauthor of Wounded I Am More Awake

PENGUIN BOOKS

THE BOSNIA LIST

KENAN TREBINCEVIC was born in Brcko in 1980 to a Bosnian Muslim family exiled in the Balkan War. He came to the United States in 1993, and became an American citizen in 2001. His work has appeared in the New York Times Magazine, the International Herald Tribune, the Wall Street Journal, Salon, and The Best American Travel Writing2012, and on American Public Media radio and NPR. He lives in Astoria, Queens, and works as a physical therapist. His website is www.kenantrebincevic.com.

SUSAN SHAPIRO is an American-born Jewish journalist who has written for the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, the Nation, Salon, the Daily Beast, the Forward, and Tablet. She is the author of eight books, including the memoirs Lighting Up, Five Men Who Broke My Heart, and Only as Good as Your World. She lives with her husband in Greenwich Village, where she is a writing professor at the New School and New York University. Her website is www.susanshapiro.net.

PENGUIN BOOKS

Published by the Penguin Group

Penguin Group (USA) LLC

375 Hudson Street

New York, New York 10014

USA | Canada | UK | Ireland | Australia | New Zealand | India | South Africa | China

penguin.com

A Penguin Random House Company

First published in Penguin Books 2014

Copyright 2014 by Kenan Trebincevic and Susan Shapiro

Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin to continue to publish books for every reader.

Photographs courtesy of Kenan Trebincevic

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

Trebincevic, Kenan, 1980

The Bosnia list : a memoir of war, exile, and return / Kenan Trebincevic and Susan Shapiro.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-0-14-312457-3 (paperback)

ISBN 978-1-101-63180-5 (eBook)

1. Trebincevic, Kenan, 1980Childhood and youth. 2. Yugoslav War, 19911995Bosnia and HercegovinaPersonal narratives, Bosnian. 3. Yugoslav War, 19911995Bosnia and HercegovinaPersonal narratives, Muslim. 4. EscapesBosnia and HercegovinaHistory20th century. 5. Trebincevic, Kenan, 1980Family. 6. Trebincevic, Kenan, 1980TravelBosnia and Hercegovina. 7. MuslimsBosnia and HercegovinaBrckoBiography. 8. Brcko (Bosnia and Hercegovina)Biography. 9. Bosnia and HercegovinaEthnic relationsHistory20th century. 10. Bosnian AmericansBiography. I. Shapiro, Susan. II. Title.

DR1313.8.T74 2014

949.703092dc23

[B] 2013035345

Map Illustrations by Daniel Lagin

This is a work of nonfiction. However, the names and identifying characteristics of certain individuals have been changed to protect their privacy, dialogue has been reconstructed to the best of the authors recollections, and some time frames have been condensed.

Penguin is committed to publishing works of quality and integrity. In that spirit, we are proud to offer this book to our readers; however, the story, the experiences, and the words are the authors alone.

Version_1

In Memory of Adisa Trebincevic

The Bosnia List

1. Confront Petra about stealing from my mother

2. Stand at Peros grave to make sure hes really dead

3. Visit the Muslim cemetery to honor my dads fallen comrades

4. Leave lilies on Grandma Eminas headstone

5. Walk across the Sava Bridge that was destroyed and rebuilt by Americans

6. Take a picture of Dad and Eldin at the concentration camp where they were imprisoned