Journalist Tim Judah’s classic account, now brought fully up to date to include the overthrow of Milo¹evic, the assassination of Zoran Djindic, the breakaway of Kosovo, and the arrest of Radovan Karad¾ic.

"The aim of this book is to trace the history of the Serbs and to explain how they came to be where they are, and in the case of Croatia were until 1995. It is to trace the way that the centre of Serbian life migrated with its people from south to north and to explain how the idea of `Serbdom,` as the Serbs call it, was kept alive during the centuries of Ottoman rule. It is also to explore why, with the fall of communism, they enthusiastically acclaimed Slobodan Milosevic, an opportunistic and cynical leader who was interested only in power."— From the preface

"Tim Judah writes splendidly. . . .The story he tells does much to explain both the Serb obsession with the treachery of outsiders and their quasi-religious faith in the eventual founding, or rather reestablishment, of the Serbian state." (Mark Danner, New York Review of Books)
"[Judah]has written a thoughtful, humane, and acute portrait of the Serbs which draws together history, modern politics, and war to explain how they came to be where they are. . . . A fine, impartial study which deserves to be translated into Serbo-Croat and will surely be consulted long after the present conflict abates." (Tom Gallagher, The Herald)