From the Bookshelf of Constant Reader…

The Cellist of Sarajevo

Steven Galloway

Start date: March 15, 2018

Finish date: April 1, 2018

Discussion: Reading List

Discussion leader: Carol

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Reading List

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What Members Thought

May 14, 2010 Jenny (Reading Envy) rated it it was amazing

Shelves: read2010, location-bosnia

Moving and powerful. And don't skip listening to Albinoni's Adagio in G Minor while reading, because it is the piece the cellist plays repeatedly throughout the book.

"This is how she believes life happens. One small thing at a time. A series of inconsequential junctions, any or none of which can lead to salvation or disaster. There are no grand moments where a person does or does not perform the act that defines their humanity. There are only moments that appear, briefly, to be this way." ...more

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Mar 20, 2018 Jane rated it really liked it

This was hard to read. It struck close to home. Two children from Sarajevo were taken in by close friends during the war Boyana and Gordon. Boya and Gogo. Boyana fared well. Gogo missed his parents so much he could barely stand it. He used credit cards that weren't his; he was miserable and eventually went back home. I remember Boyana describing sitting in the hallway as her apartment building was shelled.

The book brings that back and depicts so simply and horribly the everyday horrors of war. ...more

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Oct 17, 2009 Jennifer rated it it was amazing

A haunting short novel told from the perspective of four people during the siege of Sarajevo in the 1990s. It left me wondering what I would be like if faced with such horror and deprivation everyday.

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