Strange graffiti is appearing on the walls of a Melbourne hospital and black foam drips from Jovan’s elbows as he washes it away. An undercurrent of suspicion creeps through the corridors, the culture and the couple who fled war-torn Sarajevo but have not truly escaped …

What are we talking about?

Black Rock White City is the story of Serbian academics, Jovan Brakocevic (a poet) and his wife Suzana (a teacher) who flee the Bosnian war. The refugees now live outside Melbourne, where Jovan cleans in a hospital and Suzana cleans houses. When disturbing graffiti appears in the hospital, its anonymous writer is dubbed ‘Dr Graffito’, and Jovan must remove it.

But some things will never come clean: The horrors of war encountered firsthand. The racism and ignorance of the society in which the couple now live as refugees. The deaths and suicides that occur along with the graffiti. Jovan tries to expunge his despair through an affair with Tammie, the hospital dentist. Suzana tries to purge her pain through writing. Both balance precariously as they pick through the rubble in the wake of their trauma and as their postwar life in Australia seems so surreal.

Elevator pitch …

Patrić probes the dimensions of love, war and mourning with a compassionate eye, evocative language and knife-edge tension. There are no easy truces for Jovan and Suzana and they circle each other like wary dogs nursing the deepest of scars. War robbed Suzana of her children, her vocation and life in her own country. It left her with, ‘Nowhere to hide. Never again. That was clear. As bright and obvious as an explosion.’

The buzz …

Both Christos Tsiolkas (The Slap, Barracuda etc) and Ashley Hay (The Railwayman’s Wife) say they couldn’t put Black Rock White City down. Readings bookshop reviewer Sally Keighery says you should read it at least twice. Yes.

The talent …

A.S. Patrić is the award-winning author of Las Vegas for Vegans, which was shortlisted for the 2013 Queensland Literary Awards’ Steele Rudd Prize. He is also the author of Bruno Kramzer and The Rattler & other stories and a St Kilda bookseller.

In a nutshell …

You will see into the heart of a marriage that’s imploding and into its inhabitants’ psyches as their wounds and desperation are laid bare. Jovan and Suzana are casualties of a brutal war and an alienating adoptive country. Their haunted lives and hobbled attempts to assuage their suffering will feel disturbingly real to you.

Interesting quote to mull …

He washes his face and wishes there was a way he could wash any of it clean. The Crow has settled, sitting on its perch in the cage of his chest. There’s no way for it to ever get out again now that it’s in. Jovan’s last breath will be to cough up one final black feather. He looks at himself and sees none of this. He looks calm. In the mirror, he looks fine.

You’ll like it if …

… you like a dark, psychologically intimate story, urgent and unexpected.

You’ll hate it if …

… you’re squeamish about the trauma of war as it hits soft tissue. Or if you want to avoid facing how migrants from war-torn places like Serbia fare in our lucky country.

Why read it? …

This is one of the most compelling and troubling novels I’ve read this year. It’s edginess stays with you. Some predict it will become an Australian classic. Be ahead of the curve and read it now.

The details …

Black Rock White City
A.S. Patrić
Transit Lounge, $29.99