did not read, just removed 

Soft three. Found myself ahead of the narrative for most of its length. Very obvious Neven was an unreliable narrator, so I had to put up with Sacco’s pathetic slight of hand up until it’s third act reveal. 

Also, Sacco writes this like a giant exposition dump rather than regular dramatic storytelling. If the material itself wasn’t so interesting, this would’ve been a tedious bore. Speaks to Sacco’s mediocre storytelling abilities he nearly fumbles something this innately interesting. 

Too many confusing names

If you can get past the pervasive sexism, it's just okay. I've seen and read a lot better coverage of the war in Bosnia. This has the tone of an adolescent boy's diary. Maybe it was something special back in the dark ages of low-brow, Tim Allenesque comedy, but I just don't have a lot of patience for that shit anymore. 

i loved his book Palestine. this one wasn't as good. but, i haven't read anything about the war in Bosnia/Sarajevo, so this was helpful as a primer. he found and followed some interesting characters with complex lives during and post-war. its important to see this. but, it just didn't have the same charm as Palestine, although it was also about a hard topic, he was still able to be both a character in his own story and to find and follow other peoples stories. he wasn't really a character in this book, nor did the people we follow really have much going on, they were mostly bullshitting and describing the past, so things jumped around a lot and we didn't really get a coherent story. and maybe that's the point, that it sets that kind of mood. it just didn't grab me like Palestine did.