A forgotten place
'Red Water' exposes underbelly of tragedy in the shadow of the Balkans

The United Kingdom’s Bitter Lemon Press has become a vanguard of literary crime fiction throughout the European continent. “Murder Ink” has presented a dozen or more mysteries from Bitter Lemon over the years, and I’m always excited to see a new book come in the mail.

Today, I’m especially delighted to bring a new Bitter Lemon offering by Croatian novelist, playwright and film critic, Jurica Pavičić, entitled “Red Water.”

As with all offshore crime fiction writers – and distinct from American novelists – the wrongdoing dims in the light of the social milieu of the wrongdoers. And in “Red Water,’’ the reader spends 300 pages joining the pursuit of a missing teenage girl, first as a runaway, then as a hostage and finally, after 50 years, as a corpse of bones.

Pavičić starts out this tale in 1989 on a warm September day, “as if the sky was mocking them in advance” of dreary days to come in the Croatian town of Misto. Vesna and Jakov Vela had been married almost 18 years, and their twins, a boy named Mate and his sister, Silva, were 18 years old. 

This fascinating and densely packed story often changes narratives from third person to tricky second person and is told through the reanimation of searing memories. 

Coming-of-age Silva, pretty and gutsy just beyond the edge of arrogance, sets out stylin’ and eager one evening to attend the yearly fair down at The Cove. She tells her family not to wait up; she’ll be late.

“Silva stands at the door. To this day (Vesna) does not know whether she looked up at Silva as she walked out. She’s almost certain she didn’t say goodbye, because at that moment she could not have known. Now she knows. That moment, when Silva said ‘See you!’ flicking her dress as she headed out the front door, was the last time they would ever see her.”  

Pavičić knows how to put the words together that slow your breath. This story is about brother, Mate, looking for Silva, and their mother, Vesna, who strips skin off the lazy constabulary. Jakov, the father, joins his son to feverishly tack up posters and then slowly emasculates himself after the exhausting contemplation of finding his daughter dead or alive and uncaring and refusing, thereafter, to look for or think of her.

Pavičić has designed this story in four parts looking forward from 1989-2017. Twenty-eight years in the life of a family of three with an unaccounted fourth, through their country’s independence from Yugoslavia in 1991, regional turmoil and threats, and the constant dread of not knowing where their lovely Silva is. 

This is the story of simple people defeated by circumstances beyond their control; the daily grind of looking; the loneliness of not knowing; the averted eyes of neighbors and merchants who see the family as pathetic. Yet, they continue with the blind belief for nearly three decades that a simple, satisfied life may again be possible.

“Red Water” is not so much a story fashioned up for pages in a book as it is a shameless surveillance of a humble, working-class tragedy in a culture so different from ours. 

I read this book twice just to understand who these people were and how a simple, working-class family living in the shadow of history can incorporate the disappearance of a daughter and sister with their shame, grief and hope.

“Red Water” is not for the casual bedtime reader of mysteries. “Red Water” shows the reader the underbelly of tragedy, the grayness of the Balkans and how honest people of a forgotten place deal with a nearly useless hierarchy.

“Red Water,” published in June 2025, probably won’t be on the shelves of Maria’s Bookshop, and may not be in the library. Ask Maria’s to order the book and at least ask if their standard 15% Murder Ink discount can be applied on a special order.