Archive - September 19, 2012

Talking to Eric Kiefer by Larry Lihosit (Honduras 1975-77) Lihosit: Why write a novel about the Peace Corps instead of a memoir? Kiefer: Memoir often tends to force a reader into certain prejudgments about what the book needs to be. Memoirs happened. The difference between a memoir and a novel is plot development and this book is about as far as I could push the line. There were experiences/settings/characters I wanted to portray that quite simply, didn’t happen. There’s something to be said about that holy connection between the real and the imagined. That’s the power and beauty of a novel, after all. Lihosit: You have written non-fiction. Did you find fiction more difficult? Why? Kiefer: I’ve always found that writing nonfiction is much more confining and claustrophobic, but I tend to sweat more when I write fiction. When I was working as a newspaper reporter, the stories were always laid . . .

The Soft Exile By Eric Kiefer (Mongolia 2005-06) Gentleman Tree Publishing. $12.94 220 pages 2012 Reviewed by Lawrence F. Lihosit (Honduras, 1975-77) Fans of a young Richard Brautigan (Confederate General in Big Sur) and J.D. Salinger (Catcher In the Rye) will appreciate this debut novel told in first-person. Like the former, there are mini-chapters and understated gallows humor. As is true with the latter, the book also includes cynicism by the privileged. It is also a very different fictional Peace Corps portrait than those written by pioneer volunteers years ago which leads to the question: how and why have we changed? For other aspiring Peace Corps volunteer novelists, take note. This is a commercially published book. Mr. Kiefer is among the elite ten percent of former volunteers who found a commercial publisher and I salute him. Hopefully, this is the first of many books that he will write. In this . . .