Andrew Benesh’s Reviews > Border: A Journey to the Edge of Europe > Status Update

Done. The terminal stories - the lighthouse, the empty village, and the removal of curses - are really interesting and I wish they'd been longer. They really captures that transitional state that exists at the border, and the continued struggles between state goals and local culture.

This last part seems less focused; the 50 page chapter on Turko-Bulgarian border culture in competing police states jumped around a lot and was hard to follow. The chapter on Tako, the non-wandering gypsy seemed tighter and more impactful. Understanding how racism was used to mask economic motives and the political tension around free people is important.

It's strange to see the human traffickers at a border as sympathetic, but I suppose when things are sufficiently hopeless any opportunity is entrancing. I wonder about the truth behind Ziko's claims of pro Bono aid....

Soran and Alal are really good people in an impossible situation. It really shows that desperation that leads to people being trafficked rather than waiting for slow and ineffective refugee systems to relocate them.

The Thrace chapters are a fascinating study of cultures intersecting. The strange connection between Turkish Muslims and Christians at the border, laced with historical awareness and acceptance of diversity, is really quite hopeful. And again, the spies and victims of abuse echo the fresh political and social scars of the region.

The book has solidified a lot. It's one part political history, one part ethnography, one part philosophy. The experiences of border guards who have to live with their atrocities, of men who facilitated smuggling and crime, and of families pushed back and forth by nationalism and political expedience are haunting. There's an underlying surrealism that dwells in the border scar that so hard to pin down.

This feels like a weird narrative place between documentary and fiction; the author send very enraptured in ways that are fascinating but don't feel like an objective image.

Intriguing opening section; it's somehow between Gloria Andalzua'z Borderlands and Bill Bryson's A Walk in the Woods. There's an ever present sense of mystery and uncertainty that really captures border psychology and power. The language is excellent - when was the last time someone used the word threnody?!?