Madness Visible

Award-winning journalist Janine di Giovanni spent much of the 1990s observing the cycles of Balkan violence and vengeance from inside the cities and villages, from refugee camps, makeshift hospitals, and the homes of citizens under siege. Now, she paints an indelible portrait of the war through the staggering experiences of the people who suffered it. It was a conflict that raised challenging questions: What causes neighbours whose families have lived peacefully side by side for centuries to turn with mindless brutality against one another? How do we measure the difference between bravery and cowardice in a conflict so morally ill-defined? What becomes of survivors when the fabric of an age-old community is permanently destroyed? Searching for the answers, di Giovanni brings the human face of war into piercing focus: children dying from lack of medicine, soldiers numbed by and inured to the atrocities they committed; women driven to despair and madness by their experiences in paramilitary rape camps. Acutely perceptive, unflinching, powerfully written - "Madness Visible" will join the work of John Reed, Martha Gelhorn, Michael Herr and Ryszard Kapuscinski as a classic of its time.