Once We Are Safe

Last week, Once We Are Safe by Alessandra Carati become available in English. Translated from Italian, it follows a Bosnian family fleeing the Bosnian War in 1992. They end up in Milan, Italy, where they must rebuild a life. Still tethered to Bosnia, still hoping to at some point return, they spend decades in their new home, facing new ups and downs as siblings Aida and Ibro grow up.

What I Liked:

• Learning about Bosnia and the war that divided their country. Prior to reading this, I knew almost nothing about the conflict in Bosnia in the 1990s. (Growing up in the United States, my history classes didn’t give much attention to the world beyond America.) I’ve only read one similar book, Girl at War, which is set in Croatia around the same time. I appreciated a chance to learn a little about the Bosnian War and see how it affected so many people.
• Examination of mental health. In the wake of so much loss, Aida’s mom slips into a dark depression upon arriving in Italy. Years later, Aida’s brother, Ibro, goes through his own battle with mental illness. Each time, it affects the whole family, and they must learn to help each other in order for them all to move forward together.
• It’s a full journey. From the fleeing Bosnia to start a new life in Italy, to learning to fit into their new home and let go of the old, to the repercussions that last years and decades later, this novel shows the long-reaching affects of being displaced. It’s the immediate sense of loss, but also the complicated sense of identity and home many years later.
• In certain ways, the story comes full circle by the end. There are a few themes that bookend this story, making the ending—tragic though it is—feel more definitive.

What Didn’t Work for Me:

• It feels like two different stories. The first half of the book focuses on Aida, her family fleeing Bosnia when she’s only six years old, and how she assimilates to life in Italy in the years that follow. But at a certain point, the story shifts dramatically to Aida’s younger brother, Ibro, and his mental health struggle. That ends up being the main theme of the latter half of the book, changing the tone. While I enjoyed both parts, I do wish the novel had felt more cohesive and with a less jarring narrative switch.

Audiobook:

Lauren Ezzo narrates Once We Are Safe, and she does a great job of capturing the shifting moods as the novel progresses. And although I’m not an expert in the accents these characters would have, to my ears she did well at employing different styles of speaking and saying certain phrases in Bosnian or Italian. This is the second audiobook I’ve heard from Lauren Ezzo this year, and I’ve been impressed both times.

Final Thoughts

Once We Are Safe is a beautifully written novel of family, displacement, loss, and crafting a new life together. It’s a quick read, with short chapters like tiny fragments that make up a mosaic. From the early 1990s into the 2000s and 2010s, it offers a sweeping look at how one family reassembled their lives. This is Alessandra Carati’s first novel to be translated into English, and I hope there will be more in the near future.

Special thanks to Amazon Crossing, Brilliance Audio, and NetGalley for providing me with an ARC of this book!

Get the Book

You can buy Once We Are Safe here – it’s available as a paperback, ebook, and audiobook.

Once We Are Safe by Alessandra Carati
Translator	Linda Worell and Laura Masini (from Italian)
Audiobook Narrator	Lauren Ezzo
Audience	Adult
Genre	Contemporary Fiction
Setting	Bosnia; Italy
Number of Pages	251
Format I Read	Audiobook & Ebook (NetGalley ARCs)
Original Publication Date	October 28, 2025 (English translation)
Publisher	Amazon Crossing

Official Summary

In this award-winning novel from Italy, a family is forced to flee their home on the brink of the Bosnian War, leaving behind all that they know and forging ahead into a life they never asked for.

Aida is just six years old when her family escapes the war bearing down on their village in Bosnia. But survival comes at a price. The home they make in Italy is safe, though not their own. Aida watches, helpless, as her parents grapple with a guilt and nostalgia she doesn’t understand. They yearn for a place that no longer exists, a place she barely remembers yet comes to resent for its lingering ghost.

Not even the arrival of her baby brother seems to spark their hope for the future, but Aida refuses to drown in the past with her parents. As the family sinks deeper into grief and the scars of mental illness, Aida makes her own way forward, through adolescence and into adulthood, constantly searching for where she belongs.

Aida and her family face their struggles quietly and alone, until tragedy forces them to come together once again. But amid the greatest heartbreak, hope always rises…even when it feels like there’s nothing left.