Jordan Steven Sher is the author of the new young adult novel Dark Shadows Hover. It is based on the life of Moris Albahari, who fought with the Partisans in Yugoslavia during World War II. Sher's other books include And Still We Rise.
Q: How did you learn about Moris Albahari’s story, and at what point did you decide to write this book?
A: I have written three previous books, one historical fiction, and two nonfictions.
The last two books are centered around the 1990s war in Bosnia, which is in southeast Europe on the Balkan Peninsula. I learned of this war from two women interviewed for my very first book, who had been children in Bosnia during the war, both of whom fled to the U.S. with their families as refugees.
My intense interest in that war and the impact on people led to research and interviews of others who’d fled Bosnia, and to the next two books. Still, as a second-generation American Jew with relatives who perished in the Holocaust, I wanted to know more about what happened to Jews during that most horrible period in human history.
This led me to Moris Albahari, a Jewish boy who fought at the ages of 12-15 with the resistance in the former Yugoslavia against the Nazis and their collaborators. I was searching for a story that felt right to me, that would provide lasting memories for readers. A friend of mine knew Moris from his many visits to Sarajevo.
Moris died in October 2022 at the age of 93, but from my friend’s limited knowledge of his life, Moris’s story was worth telling. Dark Shadows Hover is the result.
Q: You call the book “biographical fiction”--what did you see as the right balance between biography and fiction as you wrote it?
A: I tried to distinguish my book from an historical fiction because Moris Albahari, the Sephardic Jewish boy whose story this is, was a real person. However, since he died a few months before I was introduced to his story, I couldn’t interview him directly, of course.
I was unable to find anyone who had fought with him as a Partisan, but I was able to speak with his son, Dado, who lives in Croatia and speaks English. Moris’s widow, Ela, does not speak English, and she lives in Sarajevo.
I did a good deal of research on both the Holocaust, and the war in the former Yugoslavia. I also found some key information on Moris both at the Shoah Foundation, and from a wonderful documentary called “Saved by Language.”
Dado reported to me that when he’d ask his father about the war the response was, “you don’t want to know.” So, along with Dado and Ela doing their own search to discover what they could from relatives and any other sources they could find, we embarked upon a joint effort to learn about Moris’s early life.
The various pieces of information ended up woven into different scenes in the book as I could only fictionalize what I believed could have happened.
Q: The scholar Rebekah Klein-Pejsova said of the book, “This is the kind of book that will reach the inner world of readers and expand their ability to imagine the life struggles and achievements of another person in their deeply uncertain place and time.” What do you think of that description?
A: I find that dialogue, thoughts, and action have to connect the characters to readers in a way that feels very real, and touches their own vulnerabilities.
While writing I’m checking my own responses and reactions to what I’m expecting from those who read my book. That’s my litmus test. If it feels real to me, then I’m hoping it’ll feel authentic to readers.
Who can’t relate to what adolescence is or was with its uncertainties, awkwardness, loneliness, moods, and joy? Imagine this phase of life with all of the turmoil that war renders.
I expect readers to ask of themselves what I often thought about while developing Moris’s story: How could a boy have gone through the trauma that Moris did, and come out mostly whole on the other side? Could I have done this? Could my children have?
Q: Can you say more about what you hope readers take away from the book?
A: A new perspective on how the Holocaust impacted people in Yugoslavia, a place that most know little about, for one.
But more deeply, what children, especially child soldiers of which there are still many around the world, encounter. Though for the Partisans it was to liberate their country from Nazi invaders, while today’s child soldiers are forced into their roles. Still, the same human developmental challenges of the young are present.
Lastly, my previous books are about the war in Bosnia in the early 1990s. As with my previous books, I want people to understand the potential for genocide is anywhere in the world, and to be mindful of the signs. Gregory Stanton’s monumental work has posited the 10 stages of genocide.
No country is immune to autocracy and ultranationalism, which certainly can result in heinous crimes against humanity. I fear that many in the younger generations today, either succumb to Holocaust denialism, don’t care about it, or don’t have enough knowledge and insight to fend it off if political, economic, and social signs point to its potential.
Books like mine strive to keep the memory of the Holocaust alive. Book banning nationally of Holocaust and many other topics that the political right sees as “brainwashing” is on the rise, and it’s quite worrisome. Holocaust books must be promoted as part of the critical thinking mantra of today’s schools.
Q: What are you working on now?
A: I have an idea for another project, an historical fiction, but frankly right now I’m promoting Dark Shadows Hover. Unless an author is well-known and connected to a publicist and large publishing company, authors are expected to do their own promoting.
It’s important for your readers to know that the writing part of the book can be challenging, frustrating, and energizing, particularly when, after a number of iterations, you feel you nailed it. And, even then, there are holes that need to be filled. Ultimately, if the book feels right, it’s a feeling of triumph.
Then, there’s the marketing and promoting. Most of us are not super fond of that part, and I have learned from my previous books to do better at it.
All I want is for people to read my books and gain perspectives and knowledge they’d not had before, and to be entertained in profound ways. I appreciate the opportunity to be interviewed for your blog. I hope this encourages your followers to check out my work. (jordanstevensher.com)
--Interview with Deborah Kalb
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