The Cellist of Sarajevoby: Steven Galloway
Genre: Historical Fiction
This is one of the few books I’ve already read for The 2nd Canadian Book Challenge. I’ve read several reviews out there about Steven Galloway’s The Cellist of Sarajevo and couldn’t resist reading it any longer. This is a wonderful book and was very glad I picked it up. It’s one of those books that have the potential of altering the way a person thinks and lives.
This is a story that surrounds an actual event. During the conflict 22 people were murdered while waiting for bread in the local square. Because of this famed cellist, Vedrin Smailovic, risked his life to play his cello for 22 days in honor of the 22 people that were killed.
Galloway tells the story through the eyes of three different characters. Each of which has a different relationship with the situation and the cellist. Personally my favourite story was that of Arrow who needed to protect the cellist during the time he played, to help keep moral up.
There were so many touching moments and the end brought tears to my eyes. In the world we currently live in there are many times we live without hope. This novel is full of inspiration and above all hope. It’s not a difficult read and deals with the subject of war as well as it can be dealt with. There was never a moment I wanted to stop reading, I just devoured this novel and I’m already of thinking of reading it a second time. And I’m not one to read novels several times, the only two I’ve ever read multiple times were: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee and George Orwell’s Animal Farm.
If you haven’t read The Cellist of Sarajevo yet you are definitely missing out. This is definitely a novel not to be missed.
Here some others that have reviewed The Cellist of Sarajevo:
Farm Lane Books Blog seems to have enjoyed the book as much as I did.
http://www.farmlanebooks.co.uk/?p=712
As usual B&b ex libris has a wonderful review of this book.
http://exlibrisbb.blogspot.com/2009/04/cellist-of-sarajevo.html
If you would like to have your review added to this list send me an email with the link to your review and it will be added.
That's the Book! 
I so agree!! This book is amazing. I loved ever page. Great review!
Thanks, it’s really not difficult to praise a book that’s as good as this one.
Thank you for linking to my review! I love the photo you found of the cellist – that picture tells half the story – seeing him playing in the ruins is so sad.
This was such a compelling story I thought it was important to include the photo. He was such an inspiration to the people of Sarajevo. It’s a picture that tells so much and it’s such a sad event but I think it’s important to remember the hope that he brought.
Nice blog about book reviews.
Thank you
I read this book last month and loved it. I really enjoyed how the book was seen through the eyes of different characters. I realized that I really knew nothing about the war in Sarajevo.
I didn’t know much about the Sarajevo conflict before reading this either. This novel has inspired me to learn more about it.