How to Tie Your Shoes is a confessional narrative that dealswith the relationship between a father and son—moreprecisely it narrates this relationship’s absence into existence.The novel begins when the narrator learns that his father isterminally ill and decides to return home to arrange for hismedical care. Mixing the most private fragments of theirfamilial saga with the turbulent recent history of post-Yu-goslav transition, the book connects seemingly divid-ed fields of private and public and suggests a strong linkbetween the two facets of trauma: individual and collective.