Pa heronj, pa bujë – No heroes, no roaring

Novel, p. 146, Botime Pegi 2017 Published in Germany by Schenk Verlag A story that crosses two times, two places, two different experiences that seem to be foreign to each other. Our hero oscillates between an unconscious love for Sarah and half-sad, half-happy memories of his childhood in Kosovo. Nim lies in a hospital bed, in a present he himself calls “Zero Time” (in both material and mental sense), reconstructing his life with continuous flashbacks. There is much to remember from the recent past, from the unknown streets of Geneva, where, as a refugee, he wanders from one bar to the next, searching for something he doesn’t even know. But also from the upheavals in his childhood, the difficult and violent relationship with his father, the stifling love of his mother, the bullying by the boys from the neighborhood, the first flirtations with classmates. One cannot focus solely on the bitter struggle of the Serbs against Kosovo, on a war that, from a child’s perspective, sometimes doesn’t seem very wild (children are happy when school closes), yet sometimes it appears in all its macabre nature. In this novel, there are no idols, only defeated people—betrayed, sometimes forgotten—who know how to beat their chests to survive. In short, it’s a novel that could have been written by any author who has experienced war firsthand and knows not only the truth but also the daily struggle to remain a flawless and mentally calm individual. The author does not judge; he simply tells the story in clear language and occasionally implies more than he says. Between the two sides of the coin, Nim wanders through the streets of Switzerland in search of an identity, one that cannot be put on and taken off like a dark winter coat, but rather stands beside you and occasionally transforms into an uncontrollable beast.