Archive - 2010

How to Cook a Crocodile: A Memoir with Recipes (Peace Corps memoir) by Bonnie Lee Black (Gabon 1996-98) Peace Corps Writers $15.99 448 pages October 2010 Review by Thurston Clarke (Tunisia 1968) I BEGAN How To Cook A Crocodile, an account of Bonnie Lee Black’s service as a Peace Corps health and nutrition volunteer in Gabon, expecting a literary and culinary homage to one of her heroes, and mine, the elegant essayist and early foodie M.F.K. Fisher, whose 1942 How To Cook A Wolf offered a bracing mixture of recipes promising appetizing meals despite the constraints of wartime rationing, peppered with commonsense wisdom for living a full and satisfying life. Black’s book turned out to be all of this, and much more. Fisher’s approach to food and life is best encapsulated by her statement, as she wrote in Wolf,“Since we must eat to live, we might as well do it . . .

Professor Profile: Charles Larson By Chris Lewis [Charles Larson is retiring from American University and was recently interviewed on campus by their student-run website. For those who don’t follow (closely) Peace Corps writers, Larson is an early published writer, mostly academic books, but also the novel, The Insect Colony, set in Nigeria, and published in 1978 by Holt, Rinehart. Charlie is best known in the academic world, here and overseas, for his work encouraging African writers and writing about their work. In this interview, published with the permission of the editor-in-chief of AWOL website, Charlie sums up his Peace Corps connection and his academic interests.]   American University’s second-longest teaching faculty member is retiring at the end of this year. Charles R. Larson is a pioneer in the study of African literature in the Western world. Chris Lewis, AWOL editor-in-chief and former Larson pupil, sat down with him to discuss his storied career. Next semester Larson will teach “The African . . .

You’ll find fiction by two Korean RPCVs Richard Wiley (Korea 1967-69) and  John Givens (Korea 1967-69) in the new issue, now on line, of Prime Number Magazine. http://www.primenumbermagazine.com/ The editor of the on-line and print publication is another Korean RPCV, Clifford Garstang (Korea 1976-78). This year Garstang won the Maria Thomas Fiction Award given by Peace Corps Writers for  his short story collection, In An Uncharted Country.  As editor of Prime Number Magazine, Cliff  is looking for short stories and essays under 4,000 words, including flash fiction and non-fiction. He is also looking for poetry of various lengths, reviews, short plays, interviews, even cover art.  To learn more, visit their site.  Prime Number Magazine is published by Press 53, a terrific small press helping to keep literature alive. http://www.press53.com/ Another Korean RPCV writer I’ve discovered is David L. Meth (Korea 1971-72) a novelist, an award-winning playwright.  David spent three years on researching his book A Hint of Light, including a year in . . .

The Incarnation of CatMan Billy by Will Jordan (Senegal 1971–72; Liberia 1972) The Press of Light 2009 310 pages $12.99 Reviewed by Patrick Chura (Lithuania 1992–94) THE INCARNATION OF CATMAN BILLY, a first novel from Will Jordan, is about “practical energy work,” a metaphysical self-help concept intended to improve the understanding and following of our “human needs and energy channels.” The author is a spiritual counselor and full-time teacher of meditation and healing. He travels the country offering one-day CatMan Billy seminars and transformational workshops. Before and after the seminars he sells this book, which was written as a vehicle for his New Age philosophy. The novel is an elaborate fantasy-allegory, with Jordan’s take on the animal world serving as a tool for correcting human behaviors and attitudes.  The short opening chapter has some good writing — it describes the birth of a litter of kittens in the rural Johnson . . .

Bonnie Lee Black (Gabon 1996-98) was a writer/editor and chef/caterer in New York City  before she joined the Peace Corps. Since returning home, she has written two memoirs about her time in Africa. How to Cook a Crocodile: A Memoir with Recipes published by our new imprint, Peace Corps Writers, has just come out. You can order her book at Amazon.com and have something really new to cook for Thanksgiving! Black is a graduate of Columbia University and has an MFA in creative writing from Antioch University in Los Angeles. She teaches English and creative nonfiction writing at the University of New Mexico in Taos and we recently discussed her memoir, the writing of it, and what’s next. • Bonnie, let me start with something simple: What’s your book about? I like to think this book answers the questions, Why in the world would a successful New York writer-editor-caterer decide to chuck it all . . .

Over the weekend I finished reading Stanley Meisler (PC/Evaluator 1963-67) new history of the Peace Corps. It was a bit nostalgic to be reading it while in D.C. for a meeting with the Deputy Director, and being in what is called the Paul D. Coverdell Peace Corps Headquarters (the naming of this building is really a miscarriage of justice,) a building located at 1111 20th Street N.W. where at 5:30 in the evening you could hear a pin drop. Where was everyone? I asked myself. PCVs overseas were working 24/7, but the staff had split by 5 o’clock and gone home like any other government bureaucrat! I will say that on this Friday night Aaron Williams was still working in his 8th floor office, and Carrie, the Deputy, was rushing back from New Jersey for our late meeting. The only other staffers I ran into in the empty hallways was Carrie Hessler-Radelet’s aide-de-camp, former four-year PCV in Paraguay, Dan Westerhof, and Bruce Cohen, who has been around the Peace Corps . . .

Becker’s Farm by William V. Timmons (Niger 1965–67) Create Space (Booksurge) $18.99 326 pages 2006 Reviewed by Darcey Meijer (Gabon 1982–84) BECKER’S FARM, BY WILLIAM TIMMONS, is a gratifying transformation story. A young German soldier is captured during World War II and sent to a POW camp in the United States. Through circumstance and by asking Jesus into his life, he is born again and effects major changes on the people and town around him. The glaring weakness in this otherwise good story is Timmons’ lack of proficiency in the use of quotation marks, which caused me to reread often. Timmons should also proofread for typos and verb tense errors. The protagonist, Helmut Sommerfield, is a prisoner in Camp Alexis, Nebraska. The prisoners are treated well, yet Helmut has no idea what the future will bring. When will the war end? Will he ever get back to Germany? What’s more, . . .