In the fall of 1992 Sarajevo is under siege. Hallie, an American doctor, joins the flood of humanitarian workers, well-meaning, but clueless, pouring into the city. Thirty-two and unmarried, Hallie is at a moment of desperation. She has a boyfriend, but the relationship is stalled and her life, in fact everybody's life, seems trivial. She wants a purpose and what bler cause could there be than saving people from gecide? But as she is drawn in to the lives of fellow volunteers and Sarajevo's locals, she discovers that good and evil are t easily separated, especially in her own actions. ANGELFISH is a well-researched literary suspense vel set during the Balkan wars. The story weaves a rich historical tapestry, drawing upon the gecide of the last century and foreshadowing today's conflict with the Islamic world.
Successful freelance journalist mostly for the Washington Post with many story credits in both personal essays and subjects ranging from history and the arts to nature and cultural life of the city. The novel contains autobiographical elements. The author's mother is a Holocaust survivor who was a childhood friend of Anne Frank. Her father is a Nobel prize winning scientist. Thus issues of compassion, human rationality, religious belief and genocide haunted the author's youth. Angelfish explores these issues in the context of the 1990's genocide in Sarajevo and the Balkans. It also delves into the more personal relationship between a mother who is a Holocaust survivor and her daughter who must both bear this legacy and somehow transcend its horrors in order to live her own life.