Author - Marian Haley Beil

Everywhere Stories: Short Fiction from a Small Planet edited by Glifford Garstang (Korea 1976–77); contributors include: Jeff Fearnside (Kazakhstan 2002–04), Jennifer Lucy Martin (Chad 1996-98) and Susi Wyss (Central African Republic 1990–92) Press 53 September 2014 234 pages $19.95 (paperback), $7.99 (Kindle) Reviewed by Jan Worth-Nelson (Tonga 76-78) • THERE’S SOMETHING POST-APOCALYPTIC about the twenty dark tales RPCV Clifford Garstang has gathered from around the world in this new short story collection, Everywhere Stories: Short Fiction from a Small Planet. If fiction is what tells us the real truth, these authors and Garstang, who has worked extensively internationally and thus could be said to be “a man of the world,” are delivering some hard news. Humanity’s dissolution into an entropy of violence and perils to the body and spirit are backdrop, foreground and theme. The worlds of these stories are unrelenting in their helplessness, almost casual cruelties, ignorance and silence . . .

From the NPCA: Early bird registration for Peace Corps Connect/Berkeley ends tomorrow! Join us June 5-6, 2015 for this annual event showcasing our community’s lifelong commitment to Peace Corps ideals. Don’t miss this opportunity to hear from Peace Corps Director Carrie Hessler-Radelet and other prominent leaders among the Peace Corps community. Click the link on this page to see the full program. You will be inspired and motivated. Peace Corps Connect/Berkeley will provide an opportunity for you to engage with your fellow RPCVs and former Peace Corps staff who share the formative foundation of the Peace Corps experience. . Peace Corps Writers at Peace Corps Connect/Berkeley Peace Corps Writers will present two programs during PC Connect. 1) Noted writer John Coyne (Ethiopia 1962–64) will talk about writing your Peace Corps memoir, and editor and book designer Marian Haley Beil (Ethiopia 1962–64) will discuss preparing your manuscript for publishing. 2)  There . . .

A Writer Writes — Death of a Politician by Gerald Karey (Turkey 1965–67) • Tom Schweich, Missouri auditor and Republican candidate for governor, died of a self-inflicted gun shot wound last month. Schweich said he was being subjected to an anti-Semitic whispering campaign. He believed that John Hancock, a GOP consultant who was elected February 21st as chairman of the Missouri Republican Party, was telling Republican donors and activists that Schweich was Jewish. Schweich was an Episcopalian and did have a Jewish grandfather. But in Judaism, the religion is passed down through the mother’s line, not the father’s. As far as the Orthodox rabbis are concerned, and by choice, Schweich was not Jewish. But is saying someone is Jewish or a Jew anti-Semitic? Not necessarily if you don’t precede it with any number of ugly adjectives, or if you don’t use it as an epithet. I’m okay if you say . . .

Lily of Peru by David C. Edmonds (Peru 1963–65) A Peace Corps Writers Book January 2015 402 pages $16.95 (paperback), $3.99 (Kindle) Reviewed by Geraldine Kennedy (Liberia 1962–64) • Peru in 1992 is besieged by the sinister evils of President Fujimura’s not-so-secret police and military, and the equally brutal atrocities of the guerilla terrorists, Shining Path. Throughout Andean villages, monuments to long-ago battles and massacres — one loss after another — display the centuries of resentment descendants of the Incas bear toward the descendants of Pizzaro and his conquistadors. The ancient is very much a part of the present. Multiple bad guys fight each other, trampling the innocent and poor with abandon. Into this violent mix, under the pretext of attending an academic conference, Professor Mark Thorsen travels to Lima for a secret rendezvous with an old love. Mark and Marisa met in Peru ten years before when he was . . .

Our Souls at Night by Kent Haruf (Turkey 1965–67) Knopf May 2015 192 pages $24.00 (hardcover), $9.99 (Kindle), $25.00 (audio CD) Reviewed by Tony D’Souza (Ivory Coast 2000–02, Madagascar 2002–03) • KENT HARUF DIED IN November at age 71; he achieved what most writers hope to, but nearly none will: he wrote beautiful, engaging, readable literary novels. Though he never realized the copious output or mass audience of the genre types, he was far superior a writer. In terms of the contemporary novel, very few could call him a peer; the short list might include Cormac McCarthy and Alice Munro. Among Peace Corps alumni literary writers, Haruf was arguably our best. His passing was noted widely in literary circles and the national press, and his achievements were commended by Governor John Hickenlooper of Colorado, where Haruf set his books. Haruf’s short novel, Our Souls at Night, releasing posthumously in May, . . .

Mort(e) by Robert Repino (Grenada 2000-2002) Soho Press January 2015 357 pages $26.95 (hardcover) Reviewed by Tony D’Souza (Ivory Coast 2000-02, Madagascar 2002-03) • IN HIS DEBUT NOVEL Mort(e) — the parenthetical in the title is clue prima facie that we are in the realm of experimental fiction — Robert Repino offers a sweeping, apocalyptic war story in which animals undergo “The Change” and rise up against their human masters. Behind the scenes and deep underground, a mutant queen ant a la James Cameron’s Aliens has produced a hormone that enters the world’s water systems; it changes animals on contact, giving them mental capacities and self-awareness equal to humans, and also morphs them physically. Just one drop and dogs and cats grow to human size, become bipedal, and their paws mutate into hands. A neutered housecat turned ragged frontline fighter, Sebastian, joins a unit of strays led by a violent . . .

Tories and Patriots: A Novel of the American Revolution by Martin R. Ganzglass (Somalia 1966-68) A Peace Corps Writers Book January 2015 354 pages $13.99 (paperback) Reviewed by Thomas E. Coyne • The “born again” patriots of this country who want to do away with Advance Placement history courses and sanitize the writing of the American story are really going to dislike this novel. Actually, it isn’t just a novel for author Martin Ganzglass is on a mission to produce accurate, readable history set in a vivid, true life atmosphere that gives the reader a “See it Now” experience. Tories and Patriots is the second in Ganzglass’s Revolutionary War series following last year’s Cannons for the Cause. The series follows Willem “Will” Stoner as he travels with General George Washington’s Continental army as a teamster and artillery man during the early days of chaotic fighting and retreating in this country’s . . .

How did it happen that David Edmonds writes a novel about Peru when he served in Chile? How did he get a PC assignment to make a movie? What was his connection with Lee Harvey Oswald? What were his skills that enabled him to set up a leather cooperative? And what about Lori Berenson? Find the answers to some of these questions — and many others in this interview with this multi-skilled RPCV. Where and when did you serve in the Peace Corps, Dave? I was a Chile IV Volunteer from 1963 to 1965 after training at Camp David in Puerto Rico. . What was your Peace Corps project assignment? Didn’t have one at first, so someone in PC/Santiago came up with the wonderful idea of making a promotional film about PC activities in Chile. I was assigned to that task along with fellow PCVs Mike Middleton, Mary Ellen Wynhausen, . . .

A Writer Writes Our un-United States: Secede, Nullify, Defy by Gerald Karey (Turkey 1965–67) In our great nation of some 300 million unruly, cussedly independent souls, someone is bound to be unhappy with government for one reason or another. In fact most are — whether it’s because of taxes, regulations, foreign policy, motorcycle helmet rules, posted speed limits or pot holes. It runs the gamut. To paraphrase a line from the Jacques Brel song, Sons Of . . . , “Who is the citizen without complaint?” But unlike other countries where complaining about the government can get you thrown into jail, in the U.S. ranting, venting and bitching about government is a national pastime. It may not change anything, you may not get any satisfaction, but, damn it, you can and will be heard. In fact, you can be heard in the White House, via a White House web site, . . .

While most authors produce fiction to provide readers with nothing but a quick thrill, David C. Edmonds (Chile 1963-65) is quickly building a reputation for intricate adventures that, as one reader put it, shouldn’t be read if one expects a good night’s sleep. His extensive travels in, and assignments to, Peru in the 1980s and 1990s exposed him to a culture in which kidnappings, assassinations, bombings, and torture were an everyday occurrence. While Edmonds won’t say how much of the narrative is true, these experiences provided the inspiration for what is now Lily of Peru in which love and terrorism collide in the international love story of a Florida university professor’s struggle to rescue the love of his life from a brutal war between the Peruvian government and a bizarre terrorist organization. “I’ve left him. It’s over. If you still want what we’ve been talking about, I’m ready. No more . . .

A Writer Writes Bam! Pow! Smack! Slam! Splat! by Gerald Karey (Turkey 1965–67) How do you know you’re getting older? Let me count the ways. Here’s one certain way — you’re slowing and everything else is speeding up: Traffic — Someone told me that traffic only seems faster because your reflexes slow with age. Maybe, but if I’m tooling along at, say,  70 mph in a 65 mph zone, I will be passed on my right and on my left by vehicles traveling, I’d say, at 80 and 85 mph, along with the obligatory tailgating. Technology — Check out your basement or attic, or visit a recycling  center. Stacks and stacks of yesterday’s must haves, waiting to be shipped off to God knows where to be stripped for reusable metals, plastic, wiring, perhaps to wind up in tomorrow’s shiny new electronic toys, where they will begin their life-cycle all over . . .

A Writer Writes Gerald Karey taught English in a middle school in a Turkish village from 1965 to 1967. After the Peace Corps, Karey worked as a general assignment reporter for two newspapers in New Jersey, and for a McGraw-Hill newsletter in Washington, D.C., where he covered energy and environmental issues. A collection of his essays entitled Unhinged, was published in October, 2014. • Look About You, There is So Much to See by Gerald Karey (Turkey 1965–67) . Ride the Staten Island Ferry across New York’s Upper Bay and look about you. It is one of the world’s most magnificent urban/sea-scapes. The Atlantic Ocean lies just beyond a suspension bridge spanning the Narrows between the boroughs of Brooklyn and Staten Island; the great hundred square mile Lower Bay protecting the Upper Bay from the Atlantic; 770 miles of waterfront; on land, towers of commerce and finance scrape the sky; . . .

To purchase any of these books from Amazon.com, click on the book cover, the bold book title, or the publishing format you would like — and Peace Corps Worldwide, an Amazon Associate, will receive a small remittance that will help support the site and the annual Peace Corps Writers awards. • The Unspoken: The Lost Novel by Christopher Conlon (Botswana 1988-90) CreateSpace January 2015 776 pages $25.95 (paperback) • Tories and Patriots: A Novel of the American Revolution (Historical Fiction) by Martin R. Ganzglass (Somalia 1966–68) A Peace Corps Writers Book January 2015 366 pages $13.99 (paperback) • Jeju Island Rambling: Self-exile in Peace Corps, 1973–1974 by David J. Nemeth (Republic of Korea 1973–74) Digital Repository, University of Toledo, Department of Geography and Planning December 2014 227 pages Free (Click to download .pdf) • Mort(e) (fiction) by Robert Repino (Grenada 2000–02) Soho Press January 2015 368 pages $26.95 (hardcover), $12.99 . . .

In November 1963, a bright Hawaiian morning is shattered by news of the assassination of the President. This marks the beginning of a journey to a remote Iranian village by a young American Peace Corps Volunteer who sets out with rebellious tenacity to do what is right, unaware of America’s loss of innocence — and his own. From a youthful determination to perpetuate Kennedy’s legacy, to coping with the reality of America’s faults and ambitions, to grappling with unfamiliar customs and languages, to discovering the friendship and love of Iranians, Tom Klobe discovers that being “Tom of Iran” is as fulfilling as being “American Tom.” A Young American in Iran is a tribute to the people of the village of Alang and Iran — to their love and to their goodness. It strives to capture the essence of life in a specific village and Iran in the mid-1960s. It is . . .