Croatia - The Ministry of Pain

 Book 39: The Ministry of Pain - Dubravka Ugrešić

"Having fled the violent breakup of Yugoslavia, Tanja Lucić is now a professor of literature at the University of Amsterdam, where she teaches a class filled with other young Yugoslav exiles, most of whom earn meager wages assembling leather and rubber S&M clothing at a sweatshop they call the "Ministry." Abandoning literature, Tanja encourages her students to indulge their "Yugonostalgia" in essays about their personal experiences during their homeland's cultural and physical disintegration. But Tanja's act of academic rebellion incites the rage of one renegade member of her class—and pulls her dangerously close to another—which, in turn, exacerbates the tensions of a life in exile that has now begun to spiral seriously out of control."

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The book takes place almost entirely in Amsterdam, but the former Yugoslavia, and the war that tore it apart, is always present. Tanja Lucić is a professor of Slavic literature...and a refugee. Most of her students are also refugees, and she struggles to figure out how to read the material of their home country without causing further harm. She takes on the role of psychiatrist - while battling her own demons. 

What results is an in-depth look at how people adapt to life in a new country (or how they don't). Each character brings their own experiences of the war and subsequent fight to rebuild their lives.