Archive - 2014

  Letters From Alfonso: Learning to Listen By Earl Kessler (Colombia 1965-68) Terra Nova Books, Santa Fe, New Mexico $13.04 (paperback), $4.99 (Kindle) 245 pages October, 2013 Reviewed by Bob Arias (Colombia 1964-66) • Earl was a third year Peace Corps Volunteer, with energy to make changes in the world and in his life. A basic Community Development Volunteer, he was first assigned to the Colombian Department of Huila were the Violencia was in full swing. Letters from Alfonso does not cover much about his first two years, though the experience comes with him when he is assigned to a new community near Cartagena on the north coast of Colombia. He tells us that as a Community Development Volunteer he knew better to wait and get to know the community, to listen. He makes a point that most NGO’s (Non-Governmental  Organizations) and Multi National agencies fail to see and understand…listen . . .

The Glory of the Kings By Dan Close (Ethiopia 1965-67) Tamarac Press $19.95 (paperback) 401 pages 2013 Reviewed by Phillip LeBel (Ethiopia 1965-67) Even if one has never been to Ethiopia, one can learn much by reading Dan Close’s historical novel, The Glory of the Kings.  For those who have, much could still be learned by his careful weaving together of various sources to give us a vivid picture of how Adwa was so important to Ethiopia’s future and a key to understanding the present dynamics of society in the Horn of Africa. Author of several previous books [1], Dan Close has put his knowledge of the 1896 Battle of Adwa into a compelling fictional narrative.  Drawing on Ethiopia’s official history, the Kebra Negast, from which the title of his book is derived, he weaves together many known details of the battle with characters drawn from his personal experience in . . .

Kay, where did you serve in the Peace Corps? I was in Peace Corps in Medellin, Colombia from 1962-64 as part of an urban community development project. Did you join right after college? Yes, I grew up in Vandergrift, that’s a small town in western Pennsylvania and went to Juniata College in Huntingdon, PA. And you joined because of Kennedy? Not only was Kennedy’s call to service resonating with me, I was intrigued with the idea of living and working in a foreign country. It was an opportunity to explore the world as well as perhaps make a contribution in a developing country. Tell us a story or two from your Peace Corps tour. Ones that sum up your experience. I have two stories. One is about our Country Director, Chris Sheldon. He was admired and appreciated by all PCVs in Colombia. His pre-Peace Corps experience has been detailed in the movie . . .

Wanderlust Satisfied is the story of Kay Gillies Dixon (Colombia 1962–64), one of the first Peace Corps Volunteers, and her  personal search through her two years of service, and how that experience changed everything about the rest of her life. Like so many Volunteers, she determined to follow her own ideals and dreams and unlearn the “Shoulds” and “Have-tos” she had been assigned by society. Kay was reared in a small town in western Pennsylvania, in the 1950s, during simpler times when a long distance telephone call was a big deal, and television sets displayed only three channels — all of them featuring stories about the Cold War, Nikita Khrushchev, and the Berlin Wall on the evening news. At the same time our country was caught in the struggle for basic civil rights for all peoples as Martin Luther King and his Southern Christian Leadership Conference worked to register voters . . .

Iracema’s Footprint (Peace Corps novel) by Bernard F. Blanche (Brazil 1965–67) Eloquest Books $21.95 460 pages April 2010 Reviewed by Deidre Swesnik (Mali 1996-98) Think Gabriel Garcia Marquez meets John Grisham. Throw in a touch of John Wayne and you’ve got yourself Iracema’s Footprint. Iracema is both the name of an Amazon warrior and the name of the village at the center of the book.  Like the villagers who spend every night in the town square circling round and round the towering statue of Iracema, the main characters swirl around in a current of dizzying misunderstanding throughout the story. At the beginning of the book, we arrive in the village of Iracema on a bus with Marcus. He’s a twenty-something community health worker from Sao Paolo going to this remote town in Brazil’s Northeast region. Soon after his arrival, he meets Ben, the local Peace Corps Volunteer. The metropolitan Paulista . . .

Where were you a PCV and what were your years and assignment? I was a PCV in Liberia I from 1962 to 1964, teaching junior high and high school social studies at Suehn Industrial Academy, a mission boarding school run by African American missionaries. Tell us a little about your background. I grew up in Lakewood, Ohio, a suburb of Cleveland, and got my BA in History at the College of Wooster, also in Ohio. I got my MA in History and African Studies at Michigan State after my Peace Corps service and my PhD in Humanities Education at Ohio State after our tours in Sierra Leone and Fiji where my husband Jack was Associate and then Peace Corps Director and where I taught in teacher training colleges. You joined the Peace Corps with your husband? Well, yes, my future husband. We applied in March 1961 when we, Jack and . . .

Caminata, A Journey By Lori DiPrete Brown (Honduras 1983-85) Global Reflections Press $10.50 (paperback); $3.99 (Kindle) 227 pages 2013 Reviewed by Dennis Harrison-Noonan (Costa Rica 1978-80) In her first published work of fiction, Caminata, A Journey Lori DiPrete Brown tells the story Beth Pellegrino and her first year after college living and  working with Mother Maria and the Sister of the Living Cross in an orphanage in Tegucigalpa, Honduras. Her story begins on the day she arrives in Honduras.  We meet the girls of the house where she will serve as their encargada. We are introduced to Luz, Felicia, Rosa and Vera, 4 teenage girls whose journey to find their roots will engage Beth in her own pilgrimage of faith and personal discovery. The author is thorough in offering answers to questions that we as curious readers have concerning Beth’s decision to leave her college love, Jake, her comfortable lifestyle . . .

Rowland Scherman was the first Peace Corps photographer. He started in 1961 at the agency and he traveled the world. Rowland helped establish the image that the world had (and has) of what the Peace Corps is, and who we are as PCVs. A book of his work, with his running narrative, has just been published. It is entitled, TIMELESS Photography of Rowland Scherman and the forward is by Judy Collins. It was published by Peter E. Randall for $29.95. You can find it at www.PERpublisher.com. In the book Rowland talks about how he got a job with the Peace Corps. This was in March 1961. Like so many others, I was thrilled by JFK’s inaugural speech. I wasn’t a “professional” photographer, really. I had been a studio assistant for a fashion guy, and I made a few dollars doing portraits “on location” on the streets of New York City. . . .

Meredith W. Cornett (Panama 1991-93) is the author of Heart of Palms: My Peace Corps Years in Tranquilla soon to be published by the University of Alabama Press, and editor of Peace Corps in Panama: Fifty Years, Many Voices published by Peace Corps Writers (2013). • Meredith, how did you find your way into the Peace Corps. Well, I was born and raised in Atlanta, and I went to Oberlin College in Ohio and majored in   biology. This is where I had my Peace Corps interview. After my tour with the Peace Corps, I attended the University of Minnesota for a MS and PhD in Forestry. . Were you involved with forestry as a PCV? Yes, I was a community forester in Panama from 1991 to 1993. It was a beautiful location in Chagres National Park in the tiny village of Tranquilla on the shores of Lake Alajuela. . What got . . .

To purchase any of these books from Amazon.com, click on the book cover or the bold book title — and Peace Corps Worldwide, an Amazon Associate, will receive a small remittance that will help support our annual writers awards. • • 44 Days Backpacking in China: The Middle Kingdom in the 21st Century, with the United States, Europe and the Fate of the World in Its Looking Glass by Jeff J. Brown (Tunisia 1980–82) 44 Days Publication $15.99 (paperback) 392 pages August 2013 • India Basin Triangle: A San Francisco Noir Thriller by Craig Carrozzi (Colombia 1978–1980) CreateSpace $14.99 (paperback), $7.99 (Kindle) 200 pages October 2013 • The Glory of the Kings (Novel) by Dan Close (Ethiopia 1966–68) The Tamarac Press $19.95 393 pages November 2013 • Somehow: Living on Uganda Time (Essays and photographs) by Douglas Cruickshank (Uganda 2009–12) Verflectin Media $60.00 420 pages 2013 • Pieces of You . . .

Vatican Waltz Roland Merullo (Micronesia 1979–80) Crown Publishing Group $23.00 (hardcover), $9.59 (Kindle), $29.95 (audio CD) 293 pages 2013 Reviewed by Patricia Taylor Edmisten (Peru 1962-64) • Cynthia Clare Pantedosi, the innocent, young protagonist of Roland Merullo’s novel, Vatican Waltz, enjoys a rich prayer life. Raised a Catholic in Boston, Cynthia senses that God may be communicating with her through visions, but she’s aware that they might simply be foolish day dreams. She’s a serious, humble woman who studies nursing and cooks for her father whose English still reflects his deep, Italian roots. She discusses her visions with Father Alberto, a liberal Catholic priest who comes to accept that Cynthia is not disturbed, and that God may be calling her to the priesthood. It is Father Alberto who gives Cynthia the nudge she needs to meet with the bishop who, after interviewing Cynthia, reluctantly points her toward Rome. The novel . . .