Croatia Books

This book is an examination of the people that lived in the Dalmatian hinterland of today's Croatia. It looks at the ways the people of coastal Dalmatia and the West perceived these people. Not an easy read for the average reader but well worth the read for those with a real keen interest in Croatian and Venetian history like myself.

The Visible Cities Guidebooks are consistently the best guidebooks in the market. They are well-informed, up-to-date and easy to use. The Dubrovinik Guide is a must-have for those who are fortunate enough to spend time in this lovely seaside town. The guided walks are a terrific feature and help you see the city through a native's eye. The book is beautifully written and is one of the few guidebooks that can be read cover to cover. Well worth the investment.

Osrpey has long been the best place to go for short concise military studies with excellent maps of conflicts. This is no exception. THe second volume in a two part series on the Yugoslav wars it examines the Kosovo war andw wars in Macedonia and Bosnia. A very good study that any military history enthusiast will enjoy.

Seth J. Frantzman

If you ever wondered why the Croats wanted independence from a Serbian-dominated country, you probably should pick up Ivo Omrcanin's review of the events in Zagreb in the spring of 1971. Zagreb Croatian Spring documents a very important but brief time in Tito's Yugoslavia. This well written documentary of Croatia's attempt for freedom under Tito even includes the notorious "Declaration of Croatian Language." This is a must for students of Croatian history and even a good read for those who want to know what Franjo Tudjman did before he became President of one of Europe's new countries

In Twyman's classic, he reveals in the intro that the basis of this book is a vision he had whilst travelling through the former Yugoslavia. Whether you believe that this vision was the product of a healthy imagination, or something deeper, is up to you. Maybe it isn't even relevant?

It's a quick read, and the story is entertaining. My main complaint about this book is that it's a bit light weight for more advanced seekers. It offers a very superficial and pithy explanation about what the emissaries are about, and this is frustrating. It's up to you whether you believe they're real or imaginary.

EMISSARY OF LIGHT by James F. Twyman shines brighter than the sun. This is an action packed true story about Twyman's invitation to perform a peace concert in war torn Bosnia during the late 1990s. He is completely transparent about sharing his raw fear, his excitement in being led to meet a hidden ancient small community of people known as the Emissaries of Light, the invitation to learn from them how to change fear into unconditional love in order to help bring about world peace. We are humbled to be able to witness the spiritual maturation of Twyman and his own peace ministry as a peace troubadour and a teacher of peace. We are humbled and privileged as we watch him walk his edge in courage, love and humility. Fear induces a heavy burden of paralysis, revenge and hate for the unknown in most people. If you read this book, it means that you were led to it by your Higher Self, your Soul. Go with your Soul and shed your own burdens. Read this book NOW!!

I found this account of James Twyman's travels to war-ravaged Croatia in the 1990s to be a very moving story. His desire to use his talents and his life to spread the message of peace is commendable and the story he tells of finding an unknown enclave of "emissaries of light" in the war zone is an amazing tale. But I was bothered by wondering all through the book:Is this story literally true?

Twyman says in the Introduction (which was removed from a later edition of the book) "This is the true story of an incredible adventure." His use of the word "adventure" is reminiscent of The Celestine Prophecy, which its author James Redfield called "An Adventure." I remember reading that many people thought the Celestine Prophecy was a true story and felt cheated when they learned it was the product of the author's imagination. But anyone who was paying attention could fairly easily figure out that the Celestine Prophecy tale was just fiction designed to teach some profound ideas. In fact, the author did not intend to mislead anyone and never wrote in an Introduction that it was a true story.

But now we have James Twyman telling us he really met these 12 emissaries in the forest and they really did project light to "the One in the Center" -- also known as The Teacher - who in turn sent this light out to humanity to counteract the negative thoughts that abound in an area torn by violence. The emissaries could make their buildings and themselves invisible to any soldiers who came too close. And, we learn, they were just waiting for James Twyman to come along so they could teach him how to make their presence and their message known to the world. However, there was no need to publicize their presence since they disappeared shortly after Twyman's visit because, we learn, they were no longer needed. The world, according to the emissaries, was about to make a giant leap in consciousness and would be able to advance spiritually without their work.

I find the story appealing and do not reject the possibility that it is true, but something about this story makes me doubt it. The author undoubtedly went to Croatia and saw the war zone. His descriptions of the country and its people are interesting and sound truthful. But the "adventure" in the forest could be an embellished story or just fiction. The idea that humanity is making a spiritual leap forward or that human consciousness is evolving to a higher level is a concept many authors have advanced. I'd like to believe it is so, but here we are more than ten years since Twyman's "adventure" in Croatia and the world is still at war in many places, people still kill others because of their religious differences, and it seems humanity is as rotten as ever.

I could easily get caught up in Twyman's vision, and I understand that some people feel it doesn't matter whether the story is literally true or not if the message is a good one. But I cannot fully embrace this story while I have doubts about its authenticity.

As in "The Celestine Prophecy", I am led by coincidences and dreams among other things. Many of the things that happened to Jimmy in "Emissary of Light" are beginning to happen to me. It is wonderful to have the leading of my Spirit confirmed so nicely in this book. We all are being called to be "Emissaries of Light".

It is time! Can you feel it? Some call it a "Gathering", some "New Earth", some a "Quickening". We know something is happening. Something BIG! We can sense the changes of our world. There is a charge of anticipation in the air.

If you feel these things, get this book. It will enable you to understand what is happening. Also James Redfield's book, "The Secret of Shambhala", will enlighten you of the future new us.

Emissary of Light offers a perspective on inner peace and tranquility. It is not a unique view for many who believe that God and peace are within each and every person just looking for a way out. But it is yet another way to explain it. The story of how James came upon this realization or I should say how it was shown to him. It starts slow but really takes off after the stage is set.

Inexplicably drawn to a conflicted part of the world he met those who try to preserve peace in the world. Not in the way you would normally think but in a spiritual way. By exuding the light of peace through mediation. The lessons on peace, love and life have been heard before but the book drew me in and would not release me for some reason. It was as if I was being told an old lesson in a new way. Is humanity ready for the next step in the evolution of their spirituality? The message of the book is that we are, although I tend to personally doubt that.

It speaks to the fact that all religions are man made and speak to the person in a way that they can understand. That it matters not which one you believe in but the fact that you believe in "The Divine Light". That people only see what they allow themselves to see and if it is Jesus or Buddha or Muhammad it makes no difference because it is the "Divine Light" behind the teaches of compassion and love that is what it is all about. I know this will not sit well with many people and this alone will turn them away from the book. But I believe there is a lot to be considered here.

I believe this book is a very good book that should be read by those interested in spirituality. And even if you don't agree with what is being said the story of the individual and his travels are interesting in themselves. As he explains what he felt and what he thought. It adds a personal dimension to the book that is interesting.

This collection of essays on life under Communism in Eastern Europe provides a unique perspective on the failure of the Communist system. Particularly memorable anecdotes include the author's misgivings over buying her daughter a Barbie doll and the actions and behaviors which became commonplace in a society in which (and this is emphasized) everyone lived in moderate to extreme poverty.
It is extremely difficult to find any personal narratives concerning Communism which are more or less politically unbiased. The author of this work seems to hold a sort of nOSTalgia for the days under Communism as a time of equality, even though this equality set the standards of living extremely low. The perspective of which this book comes from seems to be predominantly a feminist, as opposed to left or right wing, perspective, making for an enlightening read.
The bare bones downfalls of Communism are extrapolated and explored with an eye and mind which rarely condemns Communism, but rather identifies problems with an air of disappointment. The most striking shortcoming is the lack of tampons or alternatives, demonstrating the government's inability to deal with even the most basic needs of the female population.
I recommend this book as a valuable primary source for the study of the Eastern Bloc, the disinitigration of the European Communist regimes, and for a feminist perspective on some of the most glaring political issues of the 20th century.

I would have given this book three and a half stars if I had the option; but I don't, so I am giving it four, all on account of its good narrative and occasional wit.
I keep hearing and reading about what an "eye-opener" this book has been for readers in Western countries. That is all well and fine; many of the things she describes are valid information.
The problem is that this book, by empathizing (and rightly so) with the everday noodle-and-darning plight of "sisters" in other so-called Communist regimes (all of whom had a MUCH harder time than we in the former Yugoslavia ever did) tends to blur not only the HUGE political and social nuances and distinctions among the various "Communist" countries, but also inside ex-Yugoslavia itself. In short, the so-called Communist "block" was never really a "block" - it was a tapestry of many nuances and textures, depending on the country.

Admittedly, I belong to a different generation than Ms. Drakuliæ. Furthermore, I was born and grew up in the northern part of the country, called Slovenia (now, an independent state), which was, incidentally, the "richest" part of Yugoslavia. (And BTW: I don't recall any of her interlocutors in the book being a Slovene... Why not? Maybe because the situation in Slovenia wouldn't fit in with the utterly dismal picture that she is painting?)
Here are some facts: often, there were (usually short-term) shortages of different things: sugar, bananas, chocolate, detergent... I even remember a shortage of toilet paper, once. But never all at the same time, and never for very long. We never queued, like the unfortunate peoples of the Soviet satellite states. I for one DID have dolls, very pretty ones (no, NOT rag dolls) - 18 of them! If there ever was a shortage of tampons (I never use them), I certainly don't remember any shortage of sanitary towels. We were always nicely dressed and made-up; and if the clothes on offer in our own country didn't suit us, we'd make a 2 hour trip to nearby Italy, where we could buy more trendy attire. (Nobody in my family ever did that, BTW.)

No, I am not one of those short-memoried "nostalgics" who mourn the demise of the Titoist regime and the fallacy of the infamous "unity & fraternity" slogans of those days... In fact, I did every thing that I could to help erode it and bring it down.
I just resent history - ANY history - being "tailored" to suit the prefabricated expectations of foreign readers.

Had Ms. Drakuliæ decided to include a "girl talk" with a Slovene or two - who were even her "compatriots" in those times, after all - a picture slightly more complex would emerge. And maybe then people elsewhere wouldn't have been surprised by the news that Yugoslavia was falling apart... It already WAS - always had been - several different countries within one artificial structure.

In short: enjoy this book, for it tells the truth - and it tells it well! Just not the ENTIRE truth.

I will read this eye-opening book again and again. Historical accounts of communism can't paint the picture that this book has painted. This reads like poetry and is real.

I have read Drakulic's later book Balken Express, and thought this book far better. Drakulic's book is a series of essays about the difficulty of life in Eastern Europe from a woman's perspective. Communism collasped because it could not satisfy the demands of the population. Drakulic details many of those shortcomings in her book. Not only did Communism produce poor paint and bad toilet paper, it did not even produce tampons or other products for women. That is why Communism failed. Few history books will detail this perspective, but from a humanistic point of view, it is true.
The other perspective Drakulic tries to point out is that of a journalist pointing to the failures of both Communist and Western society. Drakulic portrays the homeless of NYC with the fact that in Communist society everybody is poor but not homeless. These perspectives are needed as well, because some aspects of Communism were indeed noble.
A good book about the failure of Communism. This book was a short informative read about a doomed political system.

A fascinating collection of poignant vignettes on being a woman in communist Yugoslavia (with stories of the author's friends and acquaintances in other Eastern European countries.) Ms. Drakulic shares with the West the reasons whereby 40-plus years of communist-engendered habits and viewpoints and tendencies cannot undergo an overnight "attitude adjustment". This book is a must for anyone who seeks to begin to sympathize and understand the thoughts and roots of people (especially women) who were born and raised in Eastern Europe. I bulldozed through it, and am now reading her "Cafe Europa". Eye-opening!

This book helped me to discover wonderful places to visit. Thanks a lot.

Reviewed by Olivera Baumgartner-Jackson for Reader Views (2/07)

Getting only a glimpse of the frontispiece on this charming guidebook one should be excused for thinking that its subject is a Caribbean country or one of those magical, far-away islands in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. The sandy beaches are snow-white and the water is vividly blue-green, a color that we are hard pressed to believe could truly exist in nature. Most readers will be really surprised that the cover photo actually comes from the island Cres in Croatia. Yes, Croatia is one of those relatively unknown, but exceptionally beautiful countries. It would be easy to write a clichéd, all-too-rosy book about it; yet Piers Letcher managed to do it justice without exaggerating or being too one-sided. As we learn in the Introduction, he has been visiting it for over 20 years and he evidently loves it greatly. He has also done a lot of research, which is clearly evident from the very useful General Information in Part I. This section covers all of the usual topics, from the background information to tons of practical, how-to information, even including some ideas on "how to give back" (voluntary work, charities...). The practical information section contains one of the best pieces of advice ever on how to handle the topics of the recent war in a possible conversation with the local people. "Even with a population that is now 90% Croat, as a foreigner you won't always know immediately whether you are talking to a Croat or a Serb, and even if you are sure, opinions are sufficiently divergent to be dangerous. The only really safe thing you can say, if you are asked directly, is that you're pleased it's all over, and that peace should bring prosperity." This is a tip to be remembered as it could come in handy in many similar situations just abut anywhere in the world.

The second part is The Guide, divided into seven chapters describing different regions of Croatia: Zagreb, Inland Croatia, Istria, Kvarner Bay and Islands, Northern Dalmatia, Central Dalmatia and Southern Dalmatia. Piers Letcher has a great way of mixing different elements - flora, fauna, history, humor -while describing an area, such as this inspired portrayal of the Plitvice Lakes, which happen to be one of my all-time favorites as well:

"Each of the lakes seems to be a different colour, ranging from turquoise to emerald through every blue and green you could imagine. In places the lakes seem as still and reflective as a cathedral, elsewhere they run away fast, frothing through steep gullies and shooting out from fissures in the rock. The magical noise of falling water drowns out even the shrillest of small children. On the less frequented paths it's easy to imagine the bears and wolves, as you walk across a deeply shaded bed of leaves, crunching underfoot. [...] It's inadvisable, however, to be in the wilds after nightfall - the bears and the wolves avoid the main paths and the crowds, but they do patrol out at night. [...] There have been no incidents in recent years involving tourists, but it was here, on April 16 1988 [...] that a national park warden was killed by a bear. The bear was apparently confused by a storm, and anxious to protect its cub, when it was surprised by the unfortunate warden. Being a Serb, he could probably be counted as the first victim in the Serbo-Croat war, which actually took off here in Plitvice, when the Serbs took over the management offices in March 1991."

Such vivid narratives coupled with plentiful and very detailed maps certainly make for an exceptionally useful guide book. I would highly recommend it to anybody who is lucky enough to head towards Croatia as well as to an armchair traveler ready to discover one of the better kept European secrets. For those of you who would like to understand Croatia even better, Piers Letcher put together an extraordinary list of additional reading material as well as a bunch of useful websites to visit. All of those can be found on over three pages at the very end of "Croatia, 2nd: The Bradt Travel Guide."

This book has recived very positive reviews, and not without reason. Compared to travel guides such as Lonely Planet or Rough Guide, the authors in the Bradt-series have got more freedom to form their own book. The lack of a standard format has both good and bad sides to it. One of the problems is that some authors focus very much just on the topics that interest themselves, and that is what I perceive to be a weakness in the Bradt guide to Croatia.

If you are interested in museums in the main tourist spots, then this is definitely the book for you. It focuses on the main tourist areas and on the cultural sites of these towns/cities.

However, if you are interested in places off the beaten track, you won't find much information in this book. And if you're a bit younger and want some information about nice cafés in the day-time, you won't find anything here. The same goes for night-clubs, while the authors of Bradts Guide to Serbia devotes many pages to the subject, it's a blank spot in this book.

To sum up, if you're a traveller planning to visit one or two of the most touristic sites (Dubrovnik, Hvar, Istria) just to lie in the sun or to visit museums, this book will be perfect for you. If not, you better go for the more diversified Lonely Planet's guide to Croatia.

Bradt guide is organized in a friendly format by Croatian regions. Regional and site/city specific maps along with pertinent information made exploring less confusing than our experience with other guides. Highly recommended!

Have just returned from 2 weeks in Croatia and we cannot recommend the country, or this book, highly enough. We purchased 3 titles in all, and while each had its merits this guide was by far the most insightful into the history, culture, and sights of the country. We drove, mostly, but ditched the car in both Zagreb and Dubrovnik on the advice of this book and thought that was one of the best pieces suggestions.

If you need to keep the Croatian culture in the family, you need to have this book on home!

`The Best of Croatian Cooking, Expanded Edition' by Liliana Pavicic and Gordana Pirker-Mosher is published as a member of `The Hippocrene Cookbook Library' which seems to focus on all those national and regional cuisines which will appeal to a sizable emigrant population, but which is not covered by the mainstream foodie literati. This would be just about everything except French, Italian, Spanish, Greek, `Mediterranean', Moroccan, Indian, Thai, Chinese, Japanese, German, Russian, Turkish, Lebanese, and Jewish cooking. Their real forte is for small central and eastern European nationalities such as Hungarian, Czech, Polish, Slovak, Ukrainian, and Bulgarian cooking. I am especially drawn to several of these national cuisines, having some relatives from Hungary and Slovakia.

The problem with these books in general and with this volume in particular is that amateurs in both culinary skills and journalistic or scholastic skills write them. We are not reading minor league Paula Wolferts here. That is not to say there is nothing of value here. In fact, the intellectual discoveries one can make in this book may be even more interesting than the culinary ones. Croatia lies squarely in the confluence of three culinary dynamos. Directly to the west is Italy, especially the leading culinary region of Friuli-Venezia Giulia. To the north is Vienna, the capitol of the old Austro-Hungarian Empire, of which Croatia was a part for several centuries. To the south is Greece and Turkey, the heart of the old Ottoman Empire who was Croatia's landlord before the Austrians took over. So, Croatian cuisine is a great gemish of world class influences, with a bit to add on its own, being, like Friuli-Venezia Giulia, a fertile site for grape growing and, therefore, wine making.

The authors take seriously their interest in giving a good picture of the regional cuisines of Croatia, except that they fail to handle this task effectively. Their first lapse is that they neglect to include a map of modern Croatia. I would consider this a flaw even in a book about well-known Italy. When you are covering Croatia, the omission is deadly, since the modern borders are highly irregular, shaped as it is like an hourglass tilted at a 45 degree angle, with its base on the Adriatic. When I checked my trusty Oxford Atlas of the world, I saw things of which this book gave me little inkling. And yet, it was not much help, as the book deals with provincial names, which are very difficult to see on a small-scale map.

The next failing is that they don't identify the regional source of the various recipes, after going to so much trouble to identify the culinary characteristics of each province, they don't say from which province each recipe comes. It would be very interesting to know if a strudel recipe comes from a province closer to Vienna or closer to Greece.

Speaking of strudel, the one reason I would buy this book is because it has a recipe for both strudel dough and for cabbage strudel. This reason is not compelling, as if you already own Rose Levy Beranbaum's `The Pie and Pastry Bible', you already have a whole chapter of strudel, but our authors give us a fair approach, but few tips if things go wrong. For that, you will need to go to Beranbaum.

Since we are at the confluence of three very well known cuisines, there is really very little here which is new to the experienced culinary eye. There are novelties, especially among the simpler dishes, so that the book may be a truer picture of the cuisine of poverty than most books on Italian cuisine, but the similarities are such that if you already have lots of Italian cookbooks, especially Lydia Bastianich's `La Cuisine di Lydia', you will not get much that is new (Bastianich grew up in Istria, which is now part of Croatia).

My last comment is that I think the authors may have gone just a bit too far from their roots to standard American cooking practice in that their most common cooking fat is `cooking oil'. I am willing to bet that the traditional Croatian cook, like their Italian and Greek neighbors primarily used either olive oil, pumice oil, lard, or butter, not corn or safflower oil.

If I were to pick a single recipe that makes this book worthwhile for the cookbook collector, it would be the squid and potato salad, in spite of the fact that the title and ingredients say `squid' and the procedure says `cuttlefish'. This is just another dropped detail which makes the book less than perfect.

Recommended for the foodie cookbook collector. Highly recommended it you have a Croatian background.

Croatia's turbulent history has resulted in a varied cuisine seldom reflected in regional cookbooks, and The Best of Croatian Cooking provides an excellent selection of over 200 dishes from classic main courses to desserts. Recipes have been modified for easy preparation and American kitchens but are filled with appeal and retain their cultural authenticity.

Before my trip to Croatia I wanted to become acquainted with Croatian cuisine. Also, I collect cookbooks from my travels, so this way I had the book in hand BEFORE I left and didn't have to search for it in Croatia. I have already tried several recipes which are simple and good. I was pleased with my purchase.

There alot of receipes that include pork or are pork. You can subsitute lamp or beef for some. The book is very imformative though. Some receipes come with little back grounds on where they come from and their use in holidays. So if you eat pork. Good book. If not.. Well it's still has some good stuff in it.

Stover and Peress, through searing words and photographs, have created a record of the two greatest war crimes in the conflicts that accompanied the breakup of Yugoslavia. The sack of the eastern Croatian town of Vukovar in 1991 by Serb forces, and the subsequent mass murder of over 200 patients and staff from the local hospital is still a powerful and pivotal event, not only because of the sheer magnitude of the atrocity, but also because it was the first. Vukovar came before the siege of Sarajevo, the rape and torture camps in Prijedor and Foca and elsewhere, before the destruction of Mostar bridge, and the massacre at Srebrenica. Vukovar set the standard for the atrocities that were to come, and eight years after its destruction, the town is still a hollowed-out ruin with weeds poking through shattered buildings and one-fourth of its prewar population clinging precariously to subsistence in a destroyed economy. The siege and fall of Bosnia's Srebrenica in 1995, engineered by indicted war criminal Ratko Mladic has been amply documented elsewhere, but this book is not a military history or the reconstruction of the crime. Rather it is about the search for the missing and the identification of bodies pulled from mass graves. The authors follow the forensic specialists, the anthropologists and physicians who have created a sad but necessary specialty in this field. The exhumations are part of the search for the truth, not only for the half-grieving, half-hopeful survivors who cling to rumors about their loved ones, but for all people of compassion who hope that finding some finality, and perhaps some justice, at the bottom of these graves will serve both the living and the dead. The exhumations and identifications are carried out according to strict forensic standards so the results can be used as evidence at the Hague war crimes tribunal. If we are to forge any positive legacy from these atrocities, it may lie in allowing the children of both the victims and the executioners to lead normal lives, free from fear and revenge and poisonous hatred. Memories are long in this region, and vengeance can take decades. The woman who runs an orphanage for young Srebrenica survivors observes, "What is important now is the message the international community sends to these boys and what they then tell their own children. If you say to a child, `Look, that man there killed your father, and now he lives in your house.' What kind of message is that going to send? But if you say, `That man killed your father and that is why he is in prison.' The message is very different. So, for now, there might not be a lot of hatred or revenge, but if we don't find a way to punish those responsible for these crimes, it will surely be something we can count on in the future." To date, neither Mladic nor the "Vukovar Three" are in the tribunal's custody. For the children's sake, we can do better.

This is an amazing book, detailing evidence collection by the ICTY war crimes tribunal at two mass grave sites - Srebrenica, a predominantly Muslim town in eastern Bosnia; and Vukovar, a mixed Serb-Croat town in eastern Croatia (contrary to the view of the previous reviewer, Vukovar is neither Muslim nor Bosnian). The photos are phenomenal. After a wrenching reading, one comes away with a few scattered thoughts. Namely: 'never again, and 'thank god there is an international tribunal to carry out prosecutions for these events when domestic courts are unwilling to do so'.

There have now been two ICTY indictees arrested for Srebrenica, the trial is ongoing as of this writing. None of the 'Vukovar Three', reportedly hiding out in Belgrade have been arrested yet.

Justice is far too slow. But at least with the ICTY, there is some chance for a bit of justice after all.

The war crimes comitted in Bosnia should be more at the forefront of today's headlines. The photographs by Gilles Peress are absolutely magnificent. They capture the love, life and death of a group of people as I haven't seen since photographs of the holocaust in Germany. Each picture tells a story, and though it could have said much as a pictorial the text only enhances the things we don't see. Eric Stover has brought to life the group of people working for Physicians for Human Rights and lets each reader know them and what the organization is about. This is not only a historical document, but a testament to the good and bad in humankind.

This is a hard book to rate, for any number of reasons. For one thing, it's not nicely rounded; it doesn't tell a complete story, but provides a blistering snapshot of a small slice of history and an investigation still in process. For another, its photos and text don't work closely together, but provide approximately parallel looks into the same awful tale. Hardest of all is the stunning vividness of the photography by Gilles Peress, and the nagging suspicion that we share some small portion of blame for this.

Simply put, _The Graves_ is a collection of photographs of dead bodies and skeletons, the anonymous mass graves from which they were exhumed, the remnants of their clothing and contents of their pockets, the relatives that survived them; and a text that describes the painstaking and horrifying process of trying to identify them and divine how they came to die.

Srebenica and Vukovar are two towns in eastern Bosnia-Herzegovina, where in July of 1995, hundreds of Muslim men -- unarmed, defenseless, and bound -- were apparently shot by soldiers of the Serbian army under Ratko Mladic and then bulldozed under mounds of earth.

Five years later, most of those responsible still roam freely in the former Yugoslavia, though the International Criminal Tribunal in the Hague steadily sifts evidence and issues warrants for their arrest. This book depicts some of the effort to establish evidence of their guilt ... and is itself damning evidence.

The photos by Peress, all black and white, are horridly beautiful in their mute, pinpoint clarity. They record a creepy new form of archaeology, where shiny white teeth peek out of the dirt, leg bones remain encased in socks and athletic shoes, entire bodies rise out of the near past, shorn of flesh but still comfortably clothed. They could be ancient remains, and one struggles to comprehend that they were alive, page after page of them, not very long ago.

Stover's text gives some historical context for these graphic images, records the testimony of surviving witnesses, and offers brief portraits of the men and women -- forensic pathologists, archaeologists, x-ray technicians -- who sift through this grisly treasure. Peress also photographs them at work, relaxing with a guitar, and the waiting, anxious families with their charity canned goods and stuffed toys.

This is a stark, stolid book, one that serves as a necessary reminder that what happens on the other side of the planet matters, and that no matter how much relative attention we give them, some things are worse than being sent back to Cuba to live with one's father. Much worse.

Having seen first hand the atrocities carried out in the former Yugoslavia, I was surprised by the stark reality of the superb photographs in this book. Black and white images always seem much more effective than colour. The text does not confuse the reader who knows little about the work of PHR but gives an idea of how immense the scale of the identification programme is. The book tells it like it was, and still is, for not only those people who lost friends and family, but for those people involved in the grave work. Forensic Archeologists, Anthropologists, Pathologists, Technicians and SOCOs' from all over the world give their time and energy to help identify bodies and bring the perpetrators to trial. This book puts across, in words and pictures, the real horrors of what happened in the former Yugoslavia. It is a most effective way of telling the world what did go on,and how it is still affecting, and will continue to affect peoples lives for a long time to come.

I bought 3 diff books on Croatia 2 were a waist of money. This one is by far the best. Has much much more usefull information

I used Rough Guide to Croatia side-by-side with Lonely Planet Croatia during May and June 2006. I only visited Southern and Central Dalmatia including Split, Hvar, and Dubrovnik.

The Rough Guide was the more comprehensive of the two books with a heavy emphasis on history, background, and context. It did a really good job of explaining what I was looking at, whereas LP usually gave very little of this information. But it was also less accurate when it came to logistics and directions, which made me happy I had the LP guide too.

Pros:
Better organized and more accessible than LP
Better city maps than LP on the whole--I would recommend using both though.
More detail about islands around Dubrovnik.
200+ pages longer than LP.
Did a decent job prioritizing things to see and places to go--but this section needs work.

Cons:
Some of the directions were pretty terrible and from a logistical standpoint LP was better.
Lots of useless info if you're not into architecture, art, and very detailed history of every brick and cistern.

Bottom line: A detailed, comprehensive guide but with just enough inaccuracies that I'd want LP as well.

... it is not very complete. I bought this guide because my standard, the Lonely Planet guides, got such poor reviews. This book has excellent text on early history, politics, culture, recent history & the war, etc. The travel information is quite good for what is there. The problem is that less than 20% of the book covers over 90% of the country, and many of the neatest sights are not even mentioned. The proper title should be "The Rough Guide to Croatia's Adriatic Coast." I have found more information on the internet and the Freytag & Berndt maps than this book provides *EXCEPT* for what to see in Zagreb and the Adriatic coast & islands. If you are interested in visiting the inland areas, as I am, buy a map and search the internet instead. Other letdowns include poor grammar and spelling throughout, which is surprising for a book published in the UK. Very little information is provided for finding lodging in private homes, which is the cheapest and most fun way to travel. The Croatian language guide is far too short and lacking, but if you use the book for the coast & islands only, it doesn't matter. This is truly a shame because Croatia has much, much more to offer than a beach.

I recently went for a vacation to Croatia equipped with both the Lonely Planet Croatia and the Rough Guide to Croatia. I quickly discovered how truly useless the Lonely Planet Guide is. I never really used the restaurant and club guide as I like to discover local eats on my own but the logistical travel information was tremendously helpful and always correct. It made my time in Croatia fun and easy.

I bought this guide on the advice of a traveler on a website. I'd rate it better than Lonely Planet Croatia, though that is a good book. This book has more maps and detailed information. It details each region of Croatia, tells you the accomodations in each city, as well as places to go and eat. This book tells you whether or not the city is touristy and gives some alternative options as to where to stay. Rick Steves Eastern Europe narrows the region down a bit more and gives more opinions, but Rick Steves doesn't detail the north at all.