Archive - November 1, 2015

Breathing the Same Air: A Peace Corps Romance Girard R. Christmas (Thailand 1973–76; Western Samoa 1976–78) Lulu April 2015 366 pages $22.99 (paperback), $8.99 (Kindle) Reviewed by Tino Calabia (Peru1963–65) • “I never looked at the Peace Corps as a two- or three-year excursion into the Valley of Riotous Romance,” writes Gerry Christmas, a Volunteer in the late 1970s.  And from Christmas’ epistolary memoir Breathing the Same Air: A Peace Corps Romance, his three-year tour in Thailand followed by two years in Samoa proved neither riotous nor a steamy, bodice-ripping romance. In 330 pages, 68 letters (49 to his mother and father) trace the on-again, off-again travails of Volunteer Christmas’s love sparked by a woman named Aied in Thailand. Later, 6,200 miles away in Samoa, his heart still pines for her. Through it all, his mounting success teaching English would match his success as a writer, one especially adept in . . .

Hobgoblin (reissued) John Coyne Dover Publications September 2015 330 pages $11.99 (Kindle) $14.95 (paperback) coming in November To purchase Hobgoblin from Amazon.com, click on the book cover, the bold book title or the publishing format you would like — and Peace Corps Worldwide, an Amazon Associate, will receive a small remittance that will help support this site and its annual writers awards.