This is a privileged glimpse of the former Yugoslavia from within, one that gets behind journalistic accounts to present the intimate hatreds, prejudices, aspirations & fears of its citizens. American journalist Hall spent the spring & summer of '91 traveling thru Yugoslavia, even as it crumbled in his footsteps. Having arrived a week after the catalytic 5/2 Borovo Selo massacre, he watched as political solutions were abandoned with dizzying speed & as Yugoslavia's various ethnicities, which had reached a point of tolerant coexistence, tipped into civil war. One of the last foreigners to travel unhindered thru the region, he's captured the voices of both the prominent & unknown, from Serbian demagogue Slobodan Milosevic & Bosnian leader Alija Izetbegovic to a wide variety of everyday Serbs, Croats & Muslims: "real people, likeable people," he writes, who've been pushed by rumor & propaganda into carrying out one of the most intensely brutal ethnic conflicts in history. At the same time, he provides the indispensable historical background, showing how Yugoslavia was cobbled together after WWI, tracing the ethnic cleansing practices that have marked the area for centuries & explaining why every attempt at political compromise has met with suspicious resistance. With sharp eye & flawless ear, he's caught a unique moment in history in a book that is superbly researched, beautifully written, funny, fascinating & poignant.