Archive - 2015

A Writer Writes • Fear and Loathing on the Inca Trail by Folwell Dunbar (Ecuador 1989-92) After all these years I still have flashbacks. When I see a child blindly strike a piñata or when I smell a rotten egg, the memory, lodged deep in my scarred bowels explodes to the surface. Like Marlon Brando in the heart of darkness, I recall, “The horror, the horror.” “¡Levántate Leonardito! ¡Vamos!” the campesino or farmer yelled from the base of the hill. “Get up little Leonardo! Let’s go!” Like grilled cheese, I was pressed between a lumpy straw mattress and a stack of cheap coarse blankets. I didn’t want to levántate; I was warm and reasonably content. I pretended not to hear. Moments later though, the campesino pounded on my front door causing chards of adobe to cascade down on my head. “Deme un ratito,” I pleaded. “Give me a second. I’ll . . .

My novel Hobgoblin (written in 1981) is being republished in November by Dover Publications. This is how is appears now on Amazon.com for pre-order. Ancient magic and contemporary horror combine in this tale of a lonely boy’s increasing immersion into a sword-and-sorcery fantasy game. Within the isolation of a medieval Irish manor house rebuilt on the banks of the Hudson, Scott Gardiner drifts deeper into the myth-laden world of Hobgoblin as the line between nightmare and reality erodes. This novel was first published in 1981 at the height of Dungeons & Dragons’ popularity & soon after the intense media coverage of the Egbert steam tunnel incident (urban myths wherein roleplaying gamers enacting live action role-playing games perish, often in the utility tunnels below their university campuses). Here are two reviews of the first edition from GoodRead. The book, by the way, received a 3.33 of 5 Stars from 39 reviews. . . .

To purchase any of these books 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 the site and the annual Peace Corps Writers awards. • To Banquet with the Ethiopians: A Memoir of Life Before the Alphabet (A verse memoir) by Philip Brady (Zaire 1980–82) Broadstone Books June 2015 168 pages $24.94 (hardcover); $18.50 (paperback) • The Unspoken: The Lost Novel by Christopher Conlon (Botswana 1988-90) CreateSpace January 2015 776 pages $25.95 (paperback) . • Wise Aging: Living with Joy, Resilience, & Spirit by Rabbi Rachel Cowan (Ecuador 1966–67) and and  Dr. Linda Thal Behrman House Publishing May 2015 $16.95 (paperback) . . • Mersin-10, Turkey: Six Years in Northern Cyprus (Memoir) by Eddie James Girdner (India 1968–70) CreateSpace June 2015 374 pages $19.95 . . .

The Peace Corps Writers Award for Best Travel Book was first presented in 2001. • And the winner for Best Travel Book published in 2014 is . . . . 100 Things to Do in Tampa Bay before You Die by Kristen Hare (Guyana 2000–02) Reviewer Leita Kaldi Davis (Senegal 1993–96) said about 100 Things . . .: 100 Things to Do in Tampa Bay is not your ordinary guide book, but describes the historic district of the cigar capital — Ybor City, Latin and European influences on cuisine, the awesome Salvador Dali Museum, the Ringling Museum with its circus model, professional football and soccer teams that date from the 1970s, and surrounding meccas of St. Petersburg, Clearwater and Sarasota. The book is divided into chapters on “Food and Drink,” “Music and Entertainment,” “Sports and Recreation,” Culture and History,” “Shopping and Fashion,” with suggested itineraries and seasonal activities. No tourist . . .

The Peace Corps Writers Award for Best Children’s Book was first presented in 2001. Each award is given the  year following its the publishing. This year we have something special — for the first time since Peace Corps Writers has been presenting book awards in 1990 we have a repeat winner. Just last year Jim Averbeck won the same award for his book The Market Bowl that was published in 2013. • The 2015 Award for Best Children’s Book goes to — A Hitch at the Fairmont by Jim Averbeck (Cameroon 1990–94) . In 1956 at the fabulous San Francisco Fairmont Hotel, 11-year-old Jack teams up with the famous movie director Alfred Hitchcock to uncover a plot involving drugged chocolates, mistaken identities, kidnapping, disguises, and close escapes. References to actual Hitchcock films and anecdotes abound throughout, in chapter headings, settings, and focused descriptions reminiscent of camera pan-ins. Congratulations again, Jim! . . .

The winner of the 2015 Peace Corps Writers Best Poetry Book is THE CONSOLATIONS by John W. Evans (Bangladesh 1999–2001) John Evans was twenty-nine years old and his wife, Katie, was thirty. They had met in the Peace Corps in Bangladesh, taught in Chicago, studied in Miami, and were working for a year in Romania, when they set off with friends to hike into the Carpathian Mountains. In an instant, their life together was shattered. Katie became separated from the group. When John finally found her, he could only watch helplessly as she was mauled to death by a brown bear. In the quieter, daily emotions that continue after the formal occasions for mourning are over, and in the six years that follow Katie’s death, the poems of The Consolations articulate the dislocations and disruptions of grief in a continuing life. It looks to both past and future to make . . .

Deborah Solomon, art critic of WNYC radio, reviewed  two art books under the topic “Montmartre/Montparnasse” for the Sunday, June 28th issue of the NYTimes “Book Review.” One of the books was Stanley Meisler’s  Shocking Paris: Soutine, Chagall and the Outsiders of Montparnasse. Here, in part is what Ms. Solomon had to say about Shocking Paris: I far preferred Stanley Meisler’s “Shocking Paris: Soutine, Chagall and the Outsiders of Montparnasse,” which picks up where [Sue] Roe’s book [In Montmartre: Picasso, Matiss and Modernism in Paris 1900–1910] leaves off. In 1912, irritated by an influx of tourists who were crowding the cafes and poking around in his neighborhood, Picasso moved out of his studio in the Bateau-Lavoir and across the Seine to Montparnasse, on the Left Bank. Other artists arrived in short order. Among them was Chaim Soutine, a Russian Jewish exile who became the leading Expressionist painter of his era. For . . .

First given in 1990, the Maria Thomas Fiction Award is named for the novelist Maria Thomas [Roberta Worrick (Ethiopia 1971–73)] who lost her life in August, 1989, while working in Ethiopia for a relief agency. • The winner of the 2015 Maria Thomas Fiction Award is Kilometer 99 — A Novel by Tyler McMahon (El Salvador 1999–2002) Quoting our review by Phil Damon (Ethiopia 1963–65): This is a gem of a book. It’s a coming of age saga that touches on visceral themes affecting numerous cultures in a disarmingly naïve narrative voice. Under the guise of a surfer’s escape fantasy gone haywire, author Tyler McMahon deftly enables his part-Hawaiian Peace Corps Volunteer engineer Malia to narrate her story in such a way that it unfolds on numerous levels of situation and meaning. At one level, it’s a fictional chronicle of the El Salvador earthquakes of 2001, limning the experiences of . . .