Jim Bartley, The Globe and Mail’s First Fiction Reviewer, discusses his debut novel Drina Bridge in the latest edition of The Danforth Review:

I read a lot, and I went back twice to former Yugoslavia and put a few thousand kilometres on rental cars driving to the various places and landscapes that appear in the book—Sarajevo, Belgrade, rural Bosnia and Serbia, gorgeous medieval monasteries in Serbia, ancient mosques. I met a lot of generous and accommodating people—Serb, Muslim, Croat and also Yugoslavs who don’t sport an ethnic identity—who were often a bit bewildered that this Canadian guy was writing a novel about their history and culture.

Published by Raincoast in 2006, Drina Bridge follows the story of Chris, a Torontonian traveling in Yugoslavia as civil war tears the country apart. Hoping to unearth the secrets of his dead lover’s past, Chris’ narrative becomes intertwined with the memoir of a hospitalized and embittered writer Slobodan Kusic. The result is a dark and courageous story of loss and reconciliation.

Read the TDR Interview