About Peace Corps Worldwide
Peace Corps Worldwide is a non-profit organization whose mission is to preserve the literary legacy of the Peace Corps by publishing original works of fiction and non-fiction from authors aligned with the values of global peace and partnership. We pursue this mission in three ways:
- Publishing full-length books through the Peace Corps Writers imprint that enhance cross-cultural understanding
- Producing a weekly newsletter on Substack featuring new book announcements and reviews, as well as news of interest to the Peace Corps community
- Administering the annual Peace Corps Writers Awards honoring the best published work from our community
Peace Corps Worldwide, and its publishing imprint Peace Corps Writers, are independent of, and completely autonomous from, the Peace Corps federal agency. The opinions, ideas, and narratives expressed herein are our own, and do not reflect those of the U.S. government.
Our team
Board of Directors
President and Editorial Director: Greg Emerson Bocquet (Morocco 2003, Peru 2003-05)
Greg Emerson is a journalist, editor and digital communications consultant who has worked across all aspects of publishing in the 20 years since his Peace Corps service in Morocco and Peru. As a journalist he managed digital teams at Newsday, The Wall Street Journal, HuffPost, The Atlantic, and The Intercept.
He currently supports the fundraising effort to build Peace Corps Park in Washington, D.C. as the Peace Corps Foundation’s communications lead, authoring newsletters and creating content for all digital platforms.
Greg also serves as a developmental editor on full-length manuscript projects, primarily working with non-fiction and memoir projects. He is a frequent contributor to the National Peace Corps Association’s (NPCA) WorldView magazine and manages a team of representatives of NPCA to the United Nations in New York.
Connect with Greg Emerson on LinkedIn and Goodreads
Secretary and Chief Advancement Officer: Glenn A. Blumhorst (Guatemala 1988-91)
Glenn Blumhorst became managing editor of Peace Corps Worldwide in December 2024. He is a distinguished leader in the Peace Corps community and a stalwart champion of the Peace Corps’ Third Goal as a returned Peace Corps Volunteer.
Glenn is currently leading the Peace Corps Foundation in its flagship $12 million campaign to establish Peace Corps Park on a National Park Service site near Capitol Hill and the National Mall. Glenn earned his reputation as a strategic, transformative, and visionary leader during long-term tenures at two prestigious organizations – ACDI/VOCA (1994-2012) and National Peace Corps Association (2013-22) – where he significantly increased the visibility, resources, effectiveness, and impact of both entities. He began his national service career as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Guatemala from 1988 to 1991.
Glenn is also a 2022 co-founder and CEO of Returned Peace Corps Volunteer Ventures, a public beneficiary corporation, and a 2023 co-founder and treasurer of Global Peace PAC, a 501(c)(4) political action committee. He serves on the advisory boards of the National Museum and Center for Service, Peace Corps Connect to the Future, and CorpsAfrica. He holds graduate and undergraduate degrees from the University of Missouri, where he was the 2018 recipient of the Faculty-Alumni Award, the most prestigious award given to a Mizzou alumnus.
A native of rural Missouri, Glenn is a global citizen, having lived, worked, or traveled in over 70 countries and all 50 states of the United States. He has resided abroad more than 20 cumulative years and has near-native Spanish language fluency. An aviation enthusiast, Glenn is an experienced private pilot, having logged more than 500 hours as pilot-in-command of single- and multi-engine aircraft.
Connect with Glenn Blumhorst on LinkedIn
Treasurer: Arianna Richard (Eswatini 2017-19)
Advisory Board
Review Coordinator: Cindy Mosca (Ethiopia 1967-69)
After the Peace Corps, Cindy returned to teaching art but eventually went into the field of ESL. She became the Director of the Bilingual Program, Cicero, Illinois. She has a son and a daughter who live in the Chicago area. She and her partner, Dennis live in Bloomington, Indiana. They both love to travel and share their stories (including a 2019 return to Ethiopia) on their blog.
Cindy wrote and published a book on the Peace Corps Writers imprint in 2021: Letters from a Wondrous Empire: An Epistolary Memoir, which received The 2022 PCWriters Publisher’s Award.
Outreach Coordinator: Mark Walker (Guatemala 1971-73)
Mark D. Walker was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Guatemala (1971-73). He spent over 40 years helping disadvantaged people in the developing world with agencies such as World Neighbors, Food for the Hungry, MAP International, Make-A-Wish International, and as the CEO of Hagar USA. His memoir, Different Latitudes: My Life in the Peace Corps and Beyond, was recognized by the Arizona Authors Association. The first edition of his second book, My Saddest Pleasures: 50 Years on the Road, won the Peace Corps Writers’ Award for Best Travel Book. His third book, The Guatemala Reader: Extraordinary Lives and Amazing Stories, is a Bestseller, recipient of the BookFest Award for self-discovery, travel journals, and nominated for the Eric Hoffer Award. All three books are part of the Yin & Yang of Travel Series. His wife and three children were born in Guatemala.
Advisor: Evelyn Kohl LaTorre (Peru 1964-66)
At the end of her Peace Corps service, Evelyn married a Peruvian university student and settled with her husband in the San Francisco Bay Area where they raised two sons. Evelyn worked 32 years in education as a school psychologist and a special education administrator. She holds a doctorate in Multicultural Education and has taught in colleges in the US and Mexico. Her first memoir, Between Inca Walls, won the 2021 Moritz Thomsen Peace Corps Experience Award. Her second book, Love in Any Language, A Memoir of a Cross-Cultural Marriage examines the challenges of a working mother in the 60s & 70s.
Evelyn’s passions are traveling, writing about her travels, and encouraging others to write their memoirs. She has traveled to over 105 countries and often writes about her experiences on her website.
Advisor: Steve Kaffen (Russia 1994-96; HQ staff 2003-11)
Advisor: Steven Saum (Ukraine 1994-96)
History
Peace Corps Worldwide was founded in 1989 by John Coyne and Marian Haley Beil to promote, encourage and recognize the literary efforts of writers who served in the Peace Corps.
Founding Editor Emeritus: John Coyne (Ethiopia 1962-64)
John was with the first group of Peace Corps Volunteers to go to Ethiopia and taught English in Addis Ababa. After completing his service, he worked for the Peace Corps in Washington, and then became an Associate Peace Corps Director in Ethiopia.
He left the Peace Corps in 1967 to become Dean of Admissions and Students at the SUNY/Old Westbury, and later turned to writing full time. In 1995 John returned to the Peace Corps as Special Assistant to the Associate Director for Volunteer Support where he conceived of and edited three essay books about the Peace Corps experience: To Touch the World, At Home in the World, and Peace Corps: The Great Adventure, and wrote the concept paper that outlined a new role for Peace Corps Volunteers — the Crisis Corps, later renamed Peace Corps Response. In 1996 he was appointed Manager of the New York Peace Corps Recruitment Office.
John, who is considered an authority on the history of the Peace Corps, has written or edited more than 25 books, including Going Up Country: Travel Essays by Peace Corps Writers and Living on the Edge: Fiction by Peace Corps Writers.
Founding Publisher Emerita: Marian Haley Beil (Ethiopia 1962-64)
Marian has enjoyed a variety of incarnations. As a Volunteer she taught math in a secondary school in the town of Debre Berhan. Subsequently she worked at Peace Corps/Washington, from 1965 to 1969, married RPCV Donald Beil (Somalia 1964–66) and had two sons, earned an MFA in weaving and textile design and worked as a fiber artist.
She was the founder of the nonprofit Ethiopia & Eritrea RPCVs in 1991 and for many years was president of the board; and co-founder of Rochester (NY) RPCVs.