When I reached out for book recommendations, I was happy to learn about this historical fiction novel by Nada Telarevic. Based on some true events in Telarevic's family history, this story explores the lives of young people in Yugoslavia during the years leading up to and including WWII. We follow Sofia from a young girl to a young woman, walking with her in her relationships with friends, family, early crushes, and long-term love, all through the lens of an unstable, violent, and unjust world. We watch as Sofia is forced to grow up too quickly, joining the resistance even while her young spirit and mind is developing and she aches for a lost childhood. Through it all, Sofia never gives up hope for her homeland.
While many novels about WWII are written from the perspective of the front line or those sent to concentration camps, this other cohort of historical fiction that focusses on the European citizens that faced occupation in their hometowns is intriguing. After reading Kristin Hannah's "The Nightingale", a novel from the perspective of women in France, I began to see the war from another angle, bringing that time into clearer view. When I watched the movie "Zone of Interest" (2024 Best Picture nominee) that focussed on the lives of a Nazi commander and his family in Germany, another piece of the puzzle began to fit to make a more complete image. When I read Sofia in War and Love, I noticed many overlapping elements - such as resistors meeting in secret and distributing pamphlets under immiment threat of being caught, the taking over of people's houses by Nazi commanders, or the looting of valuables and food. Just as with the other two examples, this novel helped bring that time into a little better focus, telling the story of war through human eyes and a human heart. It painted a strong picture of the lives of young people in Yugoslavia at that time, and it struck a good balance between home and family life, the realities of fighting and witnessing horror after horror, and the human need for love and connection, finding hope even as their futures seemed hopeless.
Although these war stories are never easy to digest, and not all characters' perspectives are sympathetic, the human stories of the WWII (and all wars) are imperative for all current and future generations to understand - perhaps now more than any other time in post-war history. War, just like so many other difficult concepts (domestic violence, mental illness, suicide, substance abuse, etc.) can easily remain abstract when told through statistics or stereotypes. But when told through the eyes of people, both those we agree with and those we don't, the human truth starts to emerge, helping to shape our choices for the world we wish to live in.
Sofia's is one such story, and I'm grateful to have read it.