My Heart

Semezdín Mehmedinović is a well-known Bosnian writer, and My Heart, translated from Bosnian into English, is an autofiction novel — based on Semezdín’s life in America after he left Saravejo following the Bosnian War. The story begins when the writer has a heart attack, but my favorite part — and the most emotionally powerful chapter — is when he writes of caring for his wife after her stroke, and how she lost so much of her memory. It’s a moving meditation on trauma, grief, love, and what it means to mourn for people who are still alive and places that still exist, but not as they once were.

I loved Israeli writer Etgar Keret’s blurb: “Intelligent, honest, and full of heart, Mehmedinović’s novel has all the qualities one might seek in a friend. Like a friend, it is honest enough to tell you even the harshest of truths, and, like a true friend, it ensures that you will never feel alone while you read it, even in its most heartbreaking moments.“