(digital images of this cover are more purple than the real-life one; an important thing to know)

Gipi once told me an interesting thing about his inspiration for this book.  You can probably find it somewhere around the internet, but I thought I would recap it here.

So he lives in northern Italy, right near the western border.  When the whole Bosnia/Herzegovina mess was happening practically in his backyard, he realized that if there wasn't this artifically-created country border, that would be his town, his home, and his life.  

Because he is an author, then he wrote a book about it.  And it is this book.

What's interesting to me here is that I get to say, 'this is fascinating!' and then disassociate myself, because as much as I can intellectually understand something like that, it's hard to viscerally understand it, being an American.  I mean, I guess Canada could fall into anarchy and invade us?  Or maybe Mexico?  Either of those things seems highly unlikely; there isn't the same 'this could be here,' 'dystopian future that could be now' as Gipi's experienced. 

So that seems like a good thing, I guess?  But sometimes I think that more of a sense of impending future doom could spur us on to greater heights of creativity and scientific achievement and also hopefully goodwill. 

(That's when I'm thinking on the bright side.)