Black ButterFly

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I love teaching as well as writing and teach creative writing at University College Dublin. I have a PhD in Creative Writing from the University of East Anglia and read Social Anthropology at Cambridge University. She loves Sarajevo. She knows all its alleys and courtyards, all its scents and sounds—the way the light falls at the end of their street in wintertime, the rattle of the tram, the blowsy roses that bloom each June in the mosque gardens, the plums and fogs in the autumn, the ponderous old men playing chess in the cafés, the mahalas—the old neighbourhoods—that radiate from the centre like the spiral of a snail’s shell. The author depicts the complexities of war that includes turning neighbor against neighbor, making difficult decisions to leave or stay, caring for strangers, family, and friends, waking up one day as a refugee, loyalty to neighborhood and homeland, friends and acquaintances of different ethnicities are suddenly enemies, separation of families, etc.

We're all refugees now...We spend our days waiting for water, for bread, for humanitarian handouts: beggars in our own city" Priscilla Morris’ writing is serviceable but the book excels at created an emotive atmosphere. The reader will feel Zora’s pain and pleasure when finding ways to survive and her eventual bid for freedom.

Provides comprehensive coverage of all our resident and migratory butterflies, including the latest information on newly discovered species such as the Cryptic Wood White and the Geranium Bronze. The definitive book on the subject, it includes fully updated distribution maps.

It is haunting, powerful, deep, highly recommendable, and I'm pretty sure more than one poem will touch your soul. Set in 1992, Zora Kočović is an art professor who lives in Sarajevo with her husband, Franjo (a former journalist), and her 83 years old mother. Sarajevo is a multicultural city (where the city is full of the Muslim, Serb, Croat, and Yugoslav populations) but racial sentiments, and ethnic tensions have arisen, and conflict is brewing. At this point in time, Zora decided to stay in Sarajevo for her painting and her job while Franjo and her mother traveled to England to visit their daughter Dubravka. Unfortunately, subsequent to the recognition of Bosnia as an independent and sovereign nation, the Bosnian War broke out and Sarajevo was under siege. Zora is trapped in Sarajevo and she is forced to maneuver around the constant bombings, shellings, and violence happening in the city, together with her neighbors and friends, and she has to resort to art to keep herself sane. I searched high and low for this since its publication last year. Even crossed a continent but couldn’t land a copy until I found one online this year. Finally. Art is also an important thread of the book. This is what Zora does and also really the way she expresses her love for the city and also her emotions towards it. Initially we see her painting its bridges and landscapes—and later the destruction and fires that take over the city. Art also ends up offering her solace, when she feels lost, for her neighbours sending their little daughter Una for lessons gives her (in fact them both) something to look forward to.The book is marked as literary fiction but it is more of a commercial historical fiction. This didn’t make any difference to me this time but to those who expect a book to cater to its advertised genre, this could be a minor problem.

I've always been a fan of poetry, but this, this is just a bunch of words formed together "wisely" to make a master piece! Characterization is what makes a book transcend storytelling and move into a memorable experience. As a member of the US military in the 1990s, I was part of the teams that were involved the war. So, I can honestly say this book is very accurate knowledge that I have of the situation, even though it is a novel – – historical fiction. The siege of Sarajevo is told through the eyes of Serbian artist, Zora Kocovic,as she witnesses her city crumble from the shelling of snipers in the mountains surrounding Sarajevo. Her apartment building, art studio (which sits above the library), are obliterated by the incessant bombing. The most devastating results in the death of innocent children and adults murdered while attempting to lead their “normal” and ordinary lives. What makes this book a 5 for me is the offering of ideas for solutions. It does more than identify and describe challenges. Brown is creative. I wasn’t much familiar with the details of these events except for a skeletal knowledge of the war having taken place. So I found myself a little lost at times in understanding the geography and the politics of the region. I also didn’t understand what issue the war began over. ( Then again, one of the characters says that even they fail to understand why the war started in the first place. So I guess there’s no easy answer to this question.) I would have appreciated a brief note at the end on the facts behind the cause of the war and the political climate at the time, just like the facts behind the ethnic groups were clarified in the author’s note.

Butterflies are an iconic and popular sight during the spring and summer months. They are also important indicators of a healthy ecosystem and provide valuable environmental benefits such as pest control and pollination. As food for birds, bats and other mammals they are a vital part of the food chain and have been used for centuries by scientists to investigate navigation, pest control and evolution, as well as countless other subjects.

If anything, it has done the antithesis of spurring my dormant writer's hand into action. It has submerged the wont to a discontented winter in the far reaches of my creative mind. Told from Zora’s POV, the use of third-person helped remind me that this beautifully written, descriptive, heartbreaking, and reflective story wasn’t a memoir!I bought this book in the hopes that it would rekindle my love of poetry, and maybe, just maybe, get me writing again. Thanks to Butterfly Conservation for letting us use their images throughout this article. For more information on UK butterflies and how you can help them, please visit Butterfly Conservation.org. Here you will find a wealth of information to help you find and identify butterflies and moths. Have you ever heard of such a thing? A human chain to rescue books. A moment of coming together, of resistance. But what good did it do? They say almost two million documents burnt in there. First editions, rare manuscripts, land records, newspaper archives. Our heritage destroyed in a night.