Archive - July 2015

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Clay Man A Life After Writing: Ron Arias (Peru 1963-64) Turns to Ceramics
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Great Peace Corps Writers! A List from March 2009
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Clifford Garstang (Korea 1976-77) Finalist for Indiana Authors Award
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Talking to Phillip Margolin (Liberia 1965-67)
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Urban Legends by Chris Honore’ (Colombia 1967-69)
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The Gates Discuss Their Views On Work in the Developing
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Looking For A Book Editor? Here's One I'd Recommend
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….And the Winners Are….
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The Peace Corps' Most Successful RPCV Writer
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Pick The Most Famous RPCV Writer & Win a Peace Corp Button!
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Baylor RPCV Breast Cancer Study Abandoned?
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So I Asked the Most Successful RPCV How Did It Happen
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Is This Our Famous Peace Corps Writer?
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Here is what critics, book reviewers, and other writers have to say about this RPCV Novelist
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To help you pick the 'Winning Writer' here are More facts about this person

Clay Man A Life After Writing: Ron Arias (Peru 1963-64) Turns to Ceramics

A former English teacher and newspaper and magazine journalist, most recently for 22 years at People Ron Arias has published the following books: The Road To Tamazunchale, a novel nominated for a National Book Award; Five Against the Sea, a true survival saga; Healing from the Heart, with Dr. Mehmet Oz; Moving Target: A Memoir of Pursuit, and White’s Rules:Saving Our Youth, One Kid At A Time, with Paul D. White. Most recently he publish a memoir entitled, My Life as a Pencil. An amateur potter, he now lives with his wife Joan in Hermosa Beach, California. This  article appeared recently in Southbay Magazine. Southbay Magazine by Kelly Dawson A soft melody of classical music is playing when Ron Arias enters his studio, lifting a curtain that divides the workspace from the rest of the dark garage. A single light shines above the small area and casts a warm glow on the clay-crusted potter’s wheel, desk and . . .

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Great Peace Corps Writers! A List from March 2009

Posted by John Coyne on Monday, March 2nd 2009 I was struck the other day when I got an email from an RPCV who wanted to know if I was the “most famous” of all the Peace Corps writer. Hello? “Hardly,” I wrote back. I’m not even on that list of writers. So, just in case people don’t know the many, many fine, award-winning writers who served in the Peace Corps, here is a list of the talented and best known of the corps of writer — and one of their books — who once served as Volunteers. And last but not least — Besides RPCVs, a number of members of the staff of the Peace Corps have written major novels and works of non-fiction. Among them: The writers from the Peace Corps also have won almost every major prize of literature, including the National Book Award (Norm Rush & Bob . . .

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Clifford Garstang (Korea 1976-77) Finalist for Indiana Authors Award

Clifford Garstang (Korea  1976-77 ) has been selected by The Indianapolis Public Library Foundation as an Emerging Author finalist for the 2015 Eugene & Marilyn Glick Indiana Authors Award. The goal of the Eugene & Marilyn Glick Indiana Authors Award is to elevate the written arts in Indiana, inspiring Hoosiers’ love of reading and attracting greater attention to “home-grown” literary greats. The Award celebrates authors whose quality work has made, or has the potential to make, a lasting public impact. Clifford Garstang is the author of What the Zhang Boys Know, which won the 2013 Library of Virginia Award for Fiction, and the prize-winning short story collection In an Uncharted Country. He is the editor of an anthology, Everywhere Stories: Short Fiction from a Small Planet, a finalist for the International Book Award, and Prime Number Magazine, an online quarterly. He is also the author of the popular literary blog Perpetual . . .

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Talking to Phillip Margolin (Liberia 1965-67)

Talking to Phillip Margolin Among famous and successful RPCV writers no one has a wider readership and has been more financially successful than mystery writer Phillip Margolin (Liberia 1965-67) who came home from Africa to attend New York University School of Law, then found his way to Portland, Oregon where from 1972 to 1996 he was in private practice specializing in criminal defense at the trial and appellate levels. Since 1996, however, Margolin has been writing full-time. The majority of his novels have been New York Times bestsellers. In addition to all this, his daughter grew up to become a Peace Corps Volunteer. After turning this site’s spotlight on Phillip Margolin recently, I spoke to him about his career and his bestselling novels, how he writes, and why. • Phillip, tell us something about yourself. Well, I grew up in New York City and Levittown, New York.  I graduated from . . .

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Urban Legends by Chris Honore’ (Colombia 1967-69)

Chris Honore’ was born in occupied Denmark, during WWII. After the war, he immigrated to America. He went to public schools and then attended San Jose State University and the University of California, at Berkeley, where he earned a teaching credential, an M.A. and a Ph.D. After teaching high school English for two years, he joined the Peace Corps. He’s a freelance journalist based in Ashland, Oregon. His wife owns a bookstore on Main Street. His son is a cinematographer, living in Southern California. Urban Legends by Chris Honore’ PEACE CORPS VOLUNTEERS were known, at least within the ranks, for telling stories, urban legends of a sort, passed along over a meal or coffee. Many were humorous, some anecdotal, often embellished to make a point, others so improbable as to require a suspension of disbelief, many possessing a dark edge of frustration and cynicism and resignation. One popular story that . . .

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The Gates Discuss Their Views On Work in the Developing

 Here is a welcome column by Nicholas Kristof about benevolent billionaires, Bill and Melinda Gates. In this New York Times discussion, Kristof recounts interviews with Bill and Melinda as they reflect on their 15 years work in the developing world. Here is the text to link to: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/19/opinion/sunday/nicholas-kristof-bill-and-melinda-gatess-pillow-talk.html?_r=0 The Gates talk about what they have learned and how they have adjusted their thinking about what works and what is problematic. Their efforts are tremendous and valuable. From the article: “So what mistakes did they make in their philanthropy? They say they started out too tech-focused. Now some of the measures they promote are distinctly low-tech — like breast-feeding, which could save the lives of more than 800,000 children worldwide each year. Likewise, they say, they didn’t appreciate how hard it was to translate scientific breakthroughs into actual progress in remote villages. The challenges of delivering real impact, in environments where . . .

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Looking For A Book Editor? Here's One I'd Recommend

FIRST PERSON EDITING SERVICE Now that book editors no longer actually edit, emerging writers need more help than ever. First Person Editing Service offers proofreading, fact checking, and all other editing services. Our two-person team — published author Chris Belden (Shriver) and copy editor Melissa DeMeo (Reader’s Digest, Good Housekeeping, etc.) — will whip your fiction or creative nonfiction manuscript into shape. Please visit www.firstpersonediting.com for details about our services and fees.

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The Peace Corps' Most Successful RPCV Writer

THE PEACE CORPS’ MOST SUCCESSFUL RPCV WRITER PHILIP MARGOLIN LIBERIA 1967-69 NOVELS PUBLISHED Violent Crimes (2016) Woman with a Gun (2015) Worthy Brown’s Daughter (2014) Sleight of Hand (2013) Capitol Murder (2012) Vanishing Acts (2011) Supreme Justice (2010) Fugitive (2009) Executive Privilege (2008) Proof Positive (2006) Lost Lake (2005) Sleeping Beauty (2004) Ties That Bind (2003) The Associate (2002) Wild Justice (2000) The Undertaker’s Widow (1998) The Burning Man (1996) After Dark (1995) Gone, But Not Forgotten (1993) The Last Innocent Man (1981) Heartstone (1978)

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Baylor RPCV Breast Cancer Study Abandoned?

For the last few years, a research team at Baylor University has been studying the possible link between the use of chloroquine (Aralen) and a reduced risk of breast cancer.  RPCV women have been the targeted demographic. Now, this phase of the study is ending, the use of the questionnaire is discontinued, and the methodology is being revised. The following is a review of the project. On Thursday, May 8th 2014, I posted the following on http://old.peacecorpsworldwide.org/pc-public-records/page/6/ I have edited the post. This post does include a link describing the unusual sampling method that the study attempted to use. Baylor  University has received a to study the potential of chloroquine to reduce the risk of breast cancer. The study is funded by a grant from the Congressionally Directed Medical Research Projects and administered by the U.S. Department of Defense. (Corrected: July 21, 2015) Chloroquine was taken to guard against malaria. Aralen is the name I knew for . . .

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So I Asked the Most Successful RPCV How Did It Happen

Luck played a large part. I only had one writing class, a C + in Creative Writing my sophomore year in college. I started writing a novel in law school because I couldn’t figure out how anyone could fill up 400 pages with words. My first novel was awful but I enjoyed the writing process so writing became a hobby. In my thirties a magazine published a short story I’d written and I got the self-confidence to try a serious novel but I had no idea what to do with it when I finished it because I’d never met anyone in publishing or anyone who had published a novel. I had five chapters and an outline written when a law school friend called from New York to say that he and his wife wanted to visit on vacation. I told them they could stay at my house and I would . . .

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Is This Our Famous Peace Corps Writer?

#1 New York Times bestselling master of suspense delivers his most shocking thriller yet, proving that a well-placed lie can help build a wonderful life- and a secret has the same explosive power to destroy it. A Stranger appears out of nowhere, perhaps in a bar, or a parking lot, or at the grocery store. His identity is unknown. His motives are unclear. His information is undeniable. Then he whispers a few words in your ear and disappears, leaving you picking up the pieces of your shattered world. Adam Price has a lot to lose: a comfortable marriage to a beautiful woman, two wonderful sons, and all the trappings of the American Dream: a big house, a good job, a seemingly perfect life. Then he runs into the Stranger. When he learns a devastating secret about his wife, Corinne, he confronts her, and the mirage of perfection disappears as if . . .

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Here is what critics, book reviewers, and other writers have to say about this RPCV Novelist

“It takes a really crafty storyteller to put people on the edge of their seats and keep them there.” Chicago Tribune “The masterful___plays delicious tricks on his readers.” Perri O’Shaughnessy “_____is the master of the successful suspense mystery.” Pittsburgh Tribune Review “____will have you turning pages furiously.” Otto Penzler “____makes chills race down readers’ spines.” Publishers Weekly “A master of plot and pacing-and one of those rare authors who can create a genuinely surprising ending.” Lisa Scottoline “In the hands of _____, nothing is ever simple and no one is really safe. He is the master of suspense mystery.” Associated Press “_______knows how to pack in the thrills.” Tess Gerritsen “______deliver[s] one of his cleverest cases.” Kirkus Reviews “Like his inspirations, he gives us plenty of gems: shocking situations met with clever wisecracks; sordid personal histories that tumble out in a moment of panic; broken souls who confess their love . . .

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To help you pick the 'Winning Writer' here are More facts about this person

To help you pick the ‘winner’ here are a few more facts about this writer. This writer has written 19 novels, 17 of which have been New York Times bestsellers First novel published received the Mystery Writers of America Edgar award for best original paperback mystery novel of 1978 Second novel published was made into a HBO movie Third novel was sold to 25 foreign publishers and made into a mini-series starring Brooke Shields Third novel was also a Main Selection of the Literary Guild Four novel was a Book of the Month Club section Fifth novel was a Main Selection of the Literary Guild and a Reader’s Digest condense book Sixth novel was a Book of the Month Club Section Seventh novel was a Main Selection of the Literary Guild, and selected by the Book of the Month Club Writer was also awarded a Distinguished Writers Award Writer has . . .

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