When Zlatas Diary was first published at the height of the Bosnian conflict, it became an international bestseller and was compared to , both for the freshness of its voice and the grimness of the world it describes. It begins as the day-today record of the life of a typical eleven-year-old girl, preoccupied by piano lessons and birthday parties. But as war engulfs Sarajevo, Zlata Filipovic becomes a witness to food shortages and the deaths of friends and learns to wait out bombardments in a neighbors cellar. Yet throughout she remains courageous and observant. The result is a book that has the power to move and instruct readers a world away.