Laptop computers, the internet and instant book publication have affected literature. In the case of the memoir, it has made it possible to bake a book before the dough has risen fully. It’s wise to let the dough rise and turn brown before removing it from the oven.

I really did not like the book. Crawford’s descriptions of his first Ecuadorian counterpart and host family were grotesquely graphic.
He spoke of a woman as “spawning three children.” At his second site, he alludes to friends but they do not merit the kind of cruel attention he devoted to people he did not like, be they host country or fellow Volunteers.

The clinical description of his medical problems was, in my opinion, excessive. Again, the writing was so graphic that I found myself googling Cipro to see if the side effects could have impacted his preoccupation with symptoms. In contrast, his impressive accomplishments merited only a page or two.

Crawford wrote a grant and built a greenhouse in his second site. The project went smoothly. For those of us who waited for bulldozers that never came or materials that did not “materialize” it would have been great if Crawford had provided more detail on exactly how he did this. There is much more we could have learned from Crawford’s two years, but his memoir only gives glimpses of such topics.

Crawford dismisses in one sentence the fact that he worked on a periodical for Volunteers. What was that all about? I wish that he had used his considerable skills of observation to write more about his views on the sustainability of ecotourism or the bizarre games that passed for Peace Corps technical training.

I think that Crawford needed a second medical opinion and a good editor. Both he and Kitty Thuemer live in the DC area. Perhaps, she could help him write a better book.