Fun fact about me: I was born as a refugee. The cutest picture of me ever taken is from my refugee card from Croatia where my family fled during the War.

But, I don’t remember the War. I was a toddler when it ended.

The consequences: Oh, I remember those. To someone from a “normal” country, growing up with the full knowledge some parts of your neighborhood were off limits for playing because of the mines might seem incomprehensible, but us Bosnian millennials, we know.

When I was a kid, all of media in my country had to do with the War. I think I internalized Bosnians being this suffering group of people, always crying, always sad. And don’t get me wrong. We had and will continue to have a lot of reason to be sad.

Only, the War ended 30 years ago and I still feel like I’m that child, scared of mine fields where I should be playing. When I meet someone from abroad, what’s the first thing I mention about my country: The War. Not the culture, the food, the nature, the customs, the diversity. All of that is secondary in my mind. I know it’s a bit of a “me” problem, but I know I’m not the only one.

My YA debut novel, Swallows of Mostar, is done. Edits are done, the cover is done and I couldn’t be happier.

You know what it’s about: Two girls jumping off a bridge. Not a mine filed in sight.

Not mentioning the War in a novel about a Bosnian and a Croat falling in love in Mostar would be ridiculous. Those terrible years of our past will shape our future for a long time to come. Even the Old Bridge is a reminder of what happened, the destruction in this country that should never be forgotten.

But, we can also be more, do more.

I wrote a book my teenage self needed. Yes, War happened and the whole country is still recovering from it, but look, we have this tradition of jumping off the Old Bridge that’s older than the United States! We have cool costumes! We have the coldest and coolest river in the world! We have a new generation, who wants to see these things flourish, modernized and still relevant in 2025 and beyond.

Don’t get me wrong. Please make more movies and books about what happened during the War. Tell all the stories so that they are not forgotten and repeated. But, those are not my stories to tell.

I’ll be the change I want to see in the world and whatnot. I know it sounds cliche, because it is, but someone needed to write a sapphic love story about the Old Bridge. Someone needed to mine the mythology of Bosnia and Hercegovina and have a trans girl evlija fighting an aždaja at Lukomir with the power of sevdalinka. Someone needed to write about an old Bosnian house on Majevica mountain with a curmudgeon bookworm ghost in it.

And by god, I guess it’s going to be me.

So yes, we can have YA in Bosnia and Hercegovina because we keep living, keep creating.

It’s OK to be Bosnian, little Neira. It doesn’t mean you will be sad and suffer for the rest of your life. Even if the building you’re living in still has scars from a grenade that hit it decades ago, we are more than the War. We are ćevapi, and burek and livanjski sir. We are Vijećnica, Old Bridge and stećci. We are Neretva and Una and Perućica. We are kolo and sevdalinka and so many other things that are being forgotten.