More Than Life was a pretty short story about a Isa, a CIA operative who helps out a Kosovan resistance operative named Mikail. There’s something stirring between them from the first time they meet and over the course of time, as they trade information and such, they get to know each other and fall in love. Mikail is young, but he’s integral to the resistance and Isa…I wasn’t sure what he really did. Even when the story ended, I still wasn’t sure what his whole deal was, but he was helping them out. One day it was down to the wire and Isa charged into Mikail’s childhood friend’s house where Mikail, his younger sister and their childhood friend were holing up. Isa told them that they had to go and it’s like, whatever o’clock in the morning. It was sad because Mikail already had to separate from his parents and now Isa was going to stay behind and divert the attention of the Serbian Army so that they could flee. But Mikail knew that Isa staying being behind was likely certain death. Four years passed with Mikail believing that Isa was dead, but one day he shows up.
There was a bit of white saviourism going on, so that unsettled me. And some other stuff that I don’t feel like getting into that bothered me. But those things aside, I guess I’m just not interested in actual at-war stories. I like the covert stuff, I like or rather, am drawn to the after war stuff, the life after the military stuff, but it seems like in the in-the-thick-of-it, running-for-your-life kind of stories may not be of interest to me. It’s either that or this story was actually boring. It’s a possibility.