'Funny, warm-hearted and eccentric - a glorious snapshot from a floating world' Blake Morrison
'A brilliant writer' Cathy Rentzenbrink
One night at the end of the 1970s, Mary Ethna Black, a young doctor from Northern Ireland, met Ozren, a young doctor from Yugoslavia. This was in Colombo, Sri Lanka, and a bottle of Johnnie Walker whiskey was involved, as were significant linguistic misunderstandings. He fell in love immediately; she took ten days.
Little did they know then of the many adventures that would comprise a life together. Mary and Ozren married in Belgrade just as the Balkans conflict was heating up. Working as doctors through the war - rarely on the same side - they were often separated. Afterwards, raising their son and daughter against a backdrop of post-war devastation, they had to contend with landmines and corruption alongside homework, birthday parties and teenage rebellion.

The family's adventures have taken them from Bosnia and Serbia to Australia, then back to the Balkans and eventually to London. But they always return to the Splav: the ramshackle barge on the river Sava that is their beloved refuge, true home, and favourite place to gather and tell stories ...