Tale of Two closeted gay men in 1990 Kosovo

Twenty-two-year-old Albanian, Arsim, is newly married and cautious trying to keep his head down and finish his studies in an atmosphere of creeping threat. Set in Pristina in 1995, with some sections taking place in the aftermath of the Yugoslav wars, follows a love affair between Arsim a married Albanian who want to be a writer, and Milos a Serb who has fled his abusive family to find a new life in Kosovo as a medical student.

Bolla is the story of what happens when passion and history collide when a relationship, already forbidden and laced with danger, is ripped apart by war and migration, separated by nations and fate. You are forced to live a life that is not yours, so far from your desires. Each keeps secrets, pressured by a homophobic society and the threat of war. Both men are escaping their families and seeking peace and happiness. Arsim is married to Ajshe, whom he treats appallingly, solely to conform to the wishes of his dying father and dictates of the patriarchal Kosovans. When he discovers she is pregnant, he hits her. But once he becomes enraptured with Milos, he leaves her to deal with their growing family.

 Then one day, Ratko Mladic’s forces slaughter thousands in Srebrenica, and Asim decides that it is time for his family to move to Western Europe. Three years later Kosovo is engulfed in conflict. The difficulty of refugee life is vividly expressed. Arsim finds he cannot function. His children get into fights, he beats them and grows apart from them. Ajshe stoically stands by her man. When Arsim meets someone purporting to be a 17-year-old boy on a dating site, things fall apart and he is exiled once more.

Bolla touches rape, violence, and incest, a creature from Albanian mythology that is the result of the union between a snake and God’s daughter. Events conspire to turn both Arsim and Milos into animals, acting on instinct.

Bolla by Pajtim Stafovci, Faber £14.99, 240 pages.