Witty Reviews: Free

My wife, being Albanian, has a keen interest in Albanian stories, most notably non-fiction. With Albania’s fascinating history, encompassing the Enver Hoxha communist years, the pyramid scheme collapse, and the year 1997, it really is a case of fact being stranger than fiction.

This takes me to Lea Ypi, the granddaughter of a revolutionary politician at the beginning of the Hoxha era, and her story during the 1990s and beyond. She writes from the perspective of herself as a child, with a naivety that draws you in so seamlessly. Why does she do it? Obviously, I do not know for sure, but it looks to me that she uses her naivety as a way of revealing unexpected outcomes. This works perfectly for a reader who doesn’t know much about Albania’s dark past, and so is just as naïve as a young Lea would have been.

You need an example, I know.

There is a large section of the book where the parents speak in code. They describe friends as having been sent to a university with a vague acronym, and then other friends having graduated from it. There was vague mention of friends or family going on a “trip”. As a reader, you’re constantly second guessing the underlying uneasiness of the conversations, but you are driven along by our curious narrator, Lea herself. We are in her shoes the entire time, and I felt that this did a wonderful job of applying an innocence to a dark part of Albania’s history. It made it accessible. In a literal sense, it seemed to portray how people traversed around these subjects without directly mentioning the keywords. Whether this was to protect Lea from the truth, or because they were in fear of being overheard and reported to the authorities, it’s not entirely clear, though it feels like it was a bit of both.

The other great use of this technique was how it kept the reader guessing until the moment of realisation that the conversations they were having were in fact about the treatment of the people against the Albanian communist system. Universities were prisons, while “trips” were executions. We learn at exactly the same time the true meaning of these words as Lea, making it more impactful, and allowing us to connect the dots in just a few sentences.

Another idea that runs throughout the book is freedom itself, and how its meaning shifts as Albania moves from communism to democracy. Under communism, freedom is framed as collective and ideological, something to be protected from outside influence. As the regime collapses, this gives way to a democratic version of freedom built around choice and individual rights. However, this transition is neither clean nor celebratory. Instead, Ypi shows how one rigid definition of freedom is replaced by another that is uncertain, uneven, and often disorientating, challenging the assumption that democracy automatically delivers freedom.

Although the book wonderfully navigated us through this tumultuous period of the Albanian communist period, it did feel that the first half was more impactful than the second. I believe this felt like the case because during Lea’s younger years, there was more naivety around what she did and did not know about the world she lived in. But by the second half of the book, the people had seen behind the curtain and had more control over their lives. Lea’s view of the world had been shattered, making her “one of us”. This, I believe, weakened the narrative because it lost its mystery.

That being said, it was still important to have Lea’s story unfold as it did, because it was important that we find out what happened to Lea by the end of this period of her life. We care about her, we are invested in her, and leaving us in the dark regarding how her life panned out would have been cruel for the reader.

All in, it’s a wonderful study of this period in Albania’s fascinating history, and a great book to dip your toe into its history without being overwhelmed. Using Lea’s POV throughout, makes this book accessible and impactful. Once you’ve finished this book, you’ll certainly know a lot more that you did before.