From the award-winning author of The Bookseller of Kabul comes a fascinating insight into the lives of ordinary Serbs under Milosevic and the dramati c events leading up to his fall. Asne Seierstad's first book, which some consider to be her best, follows fourteen Serbs whose lives were transformed over the course of sixteen months. With characteristic perception and honesty, Seierstad offers an intimate portrait of these individuals, and a vivid study of the civil war and its aftermath. First published in 2000, WITH THEIR BACKS TO THE WORLD was updated extensively by the author in 2004.