For readers of The Tiger's Wife and All the Light We Cannot See comes a powerful debut novel
about a girl's coming of age-and how her sense of family friendship love and belonging is
profoundly shaped by war. NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY BOOKPAGE BOOKLIST AND
ELECTRIC LITERATURE • ALEX AWARD WINNER • LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK PRIZE FINALIST • LONGLISTED
FOR THE BAILEYS WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION Zagreb 1991. Ana Juric is a carefree ten-year-old
living with her family in a small apartment in Croatia's capital. But that year civil war
breaks out across Yugoslavia splintering Ana's idyllic childhood. Daily life is altered by
food rations and air raid drills and soccer matches are replaced by sniper fire. Neighbors
grow suspicious of one another and Ana's sense of safety starts to fray. When the war arrives
at her doorstep Ana must find her way in a dangerous world. New York 2001. Ana is now a
college student in Manhattan. Though she's tried to move on from her past she can't escape her
memories of war-secrets she keeps even from those closest to her. Haunted by the events that
forever changed her family Ana returns to Croatia after a decade away hoping to make peace
with the place she once called home. As she faces her ghosts she must come to terms with her
country's difficult history and the events that interrupted her childhood years before.
Moving back and forth through time Girl at War is an honest generous brilliantly written
novel that illuminates how history shapes the individual. Sara Novic fearlessly shows the
impact of war on one young girl-and its legacy on all of us. It's a debut by a writer who has
stared into recent history to find a story that continues to resonate today. Praise for Girl
at War "Outstanding . . . Girl at War performs the miracle of making the stories of broken
lives in a distant country feel as large and universal as myth."-The New York Times Book Review
(Editor's Choice) "[An] old-fashioned page-turner that will demand all of the reader's
attention happily given. A debut novel that astonishes."-Vanity Fair "Shattering . . . The
book begins with what deserves to become one of contemporary literature's more memorable
opening lines. The sentences that follow are equally as lyrical as a folk lament and as taut as
metal wire wrapped through an electrified fence."-USA Today
