Sasa Stanisic's Where You Come From is a novel about a village where only thirteen people remain, a country that no longer exists, a shattered family that is his own. Blending autofiction, fable, and choose-your-own-adventure, Stanisic explores his family's escape during the conflict in Yugoslavia, and the years that followed as they built a life in Germany. He examines what it means to learn a new language, to find new friends and new jobs, to build an identity between countries and cultures. He also chronicles his grandmother's struggle with dementia: while he was gathering his memories, she was losing hers. Translated by Damion Searls, Where You Come From is a self-portrait with ancestors, but also the breakdown of the idea of a self-portrait. It's a book about Stanisic's homelands, both remembered and imagined. A book that bends form and genre with wit, heart, and exceptional craftsmanship to explore questions that lie inside all of us: about language and shame, about arrival and making it just in time, about luck and death, about what role our origins and memories play in our lives.
Where You Come From