My Childhood under Fire: A Sarajevo Diary (review)

Halilbegovich was twelve years old when war came to her home in Sarajevo in April of 1992; in the weeks following the first attacks, she began to keep a diary and continued to write in that diary until her escape from Bosnia and Herzegovina in August of 1995. The diary, now translated into English, is offered here as a record of the war-torn years of 1992-1995 and as a message to readers about the senselessness of war. The diary entries are occasionally interrupted by Halilbegovich's contemporary reflections, which are set apart in a different font and offer some context for her adolescent writings. Though the writing at times wavers between dry narrative description and overdramatization, it is generally impressive for someone so young; her thoughts and feelings are captured evocatively, and the reflections on accounts of the dead and wounded woven throughout the entries add depth to her writing. The volume suffers for lack of factual grounding, however; very little historical context is given for the war (the enemy is referred to as "the oppressor") and no explanation is offered for the motivation behind the attacks, so that a reader without background knowledge of the region will not come away with any further understanding (Halilbegovich does offer criticism of NATO's inconsistent protection in the later years, as well as frustration with the UN for their lack of involvement). This would, however, function effectively as a supplement to a unit on the Balkan conflicts and an excellent resource for exploring an adolescent point-of-view on the era. Black-and-white family photographs are interspersed throughout the book, as are pencil sketches from the pages of Halilbegovich's original diary. An afterword is included.