Where the Ashes Bloom

Torn from her homeland by the brutal Yugoslav civil war in 1995, a young girl survives the unimaginable—and is adopted into a new life in Australia. But her trauma is buried so deep, she forgets who she truly is.

Now 25 years old, her carefully constructed life begins to crack. Haunting flashbacks stir memories she thought were lost forever—fragments of another name, another family, another world. With only scattered images and a relentless pull toward a forgotten past, she embarks on a courageous journey back to the war-torn land of her childhood.

As the line between memory and reality blurs, she must confront buried truths, reclaim her identity, and find the place where her story began.

Where the Ashes Bloom is a powerful and emotionally rich story about survival, identity, and the healing power of coming home.

Perfect for readers of The Tattooist of Auschwitz, The Girl Who Smiled Beads, American Dirt, and The Memory Keeper of Kyiv—this novel explores the resilience of the human spirit in the face of loss, war, and the search for self.