Book Reviews

  This Sunday’s New York Times, December 26, 2021, has a review of Tom Bissell’s (Uzbekistan 1996) Creative Types And Other Stories. written by Zachary Lazar. Reviewing Tom’s collection, Lazar sums up: “Vigilantes, bullies, expats: To tell you the “subjects” of these stories is to tell you almost nothing about the experience of reading them, their stylistic flair, the unpredictability of their movements. They reminded me of how fiction can be not just a form of escape but a way to get lost in the actual strangeness of this world, those crooked roads that lead us through flashes of horror, delight and sudden recognition.” Creative Types and Other Stories By Tom Bissell (Uzbekistan 1996) Pantheon 225 pages March 2021 $12.99 (Kindle); $25.95 (hardback), $14.70 (Audible)

  Somewhere in the Middle: A journey to the Philippines in search of roots, belonging, and identity Deborah Francisco Douglas (Philippines 2011–14) Peaceful Mountain Press, 2019 254 pages $14.99 (paperback); $8.99 (Kindle) Reviewed by Janet Lee (Ethiopia 1974-76) • Somewhere in the Middle, by Deborah Francisco Douglas, is a delightful memoir that captivated my interest from the first page. Her use of dialogue, recreated from memories, journals, and blog posts, was an effective tool in telling her story. Vendors’ calls of “Balut” (dragged out as if a chant, “Baluuuuuuuut!”) or “Taho” (“Tahoooooooooo!”) reminded me so much of my short stays in the neighborhoods of metro-Manila. [Balut is a partially-developed duck embryo that is softboiled and considered a breakfast treat. Taho is a delicious custard drizzled with caramel syrup.] She approximates the accents in the dialogues through the use of switching out “d” for the “th” sound, and “p” for “f” . . .

  Water Drumming in the Soul: A Novel of Racy Love in the Heart of Africa by Eric Madeen (Gabon 1981-83) Independently published 218 pages April 2021 $ 2.99 (Kindle); $9.99 (Paperback) Reviewed by Sue Hoyt Aiken (Ethiopia 1962-64) • Readers are quickly drawn into the adventure of David as he travels in a foreign culture as seen through his eyes as a newly arrived Peace Corps Volunteer approaching the area where he will live and work for two years deep in Africa. Countless descriptions scattered throughout the book remind us how much the environment influences and impacts those who live there. All of our senses are called upon, including the sound of water drumming as it reverberates into David’s soul drawing him to the origin of the drumming, a beautiful nude brown woman glimmering in a pool of water beating the water with her hands like an instrument, singing as . . .

  Nothing Works But Everything Works Out: My Peace Corps Experience in the West Region of Cameroon Leigh Marie Dannhauser (Cameroon 2017–19) Independently published, 2019 188 pages $14.99 (paperback), $5.99 (Kindle) Reviewed by Eric Madeen (Gabon 1981-83) • During Leigh Marie Dannhauser’s Peace Corps experience in Cameroon as an agriculture volunteer she dutifully kept a journal, and the contents of that journal fill this memoir. It starts with her acceptance of assignment which was initially for Peru, but then gets switched to Cameroon along with the job. The memoir is on point in giving the highlights and challenges (boo-coo!) of daily life and could very well serve as a primer of sorts for future volunteers to Cameroon at staging or better yet required reading prior to being accepted for assignment, to give them an accurate assessment of what they’d be up against. And there’s much! Having served in Gabon (1981–83) . . .

  Love and Latrines in the Land of Spiderweb Lace: A Peace Corps Memoir by Mary Lou Shefsky (Paraguay 1974–76) Blurb, 2021 218 pages $38.89 (paperback – full color), $9.99 (Kindle) Reviewed by Kim Herman (Dominican Republic 196  ) • I thoroughly enjoyed reading this Peace Corps memoir because the book demonstrates Mary Lou Shefsky’s deep connections and commitment to the people and families she met during her service. I found the details in the book both surprising and enjoyable as she describes her work, her problems, and the deep relationships she develops with her Paraguayan friends and “family.” She also writes about her many continuing visits with them, both in Paraguay and the US, following her service, which is a common theme among returned Volunteers who shared many great experiences with host country nationals and the people they served. The many photographs in the book add a great deal to . . .

  Driving Jesus to Little Rock by Roland Merullo (Micronesia 1979-80) Pfp Publisher 280 pages September 2021 $9.85 (Kindle); $17,85 (Paperback); $28.00 (Hardcover)   Reviewed by Patricia Taylor Edmisten (Peru 1962-64) • Eddie Valpolicella, a successful novelist, and a Roman Catholic by birth, is the protagonist in this engaging novel. Eddie is invited to do a reading gig for a Methodist group in Little Rock. It is still slush time in the Northeast and Eddie chooses a road trip over air travel because he needs time for himself and wants to experience springtime greening as he heads south. Having said goodbye to his wife and family, Eddie rumbles along, grateful for this gift of time, surprised and content that people in Little Rock are familiar with his books. A good guy, Eddie stops to pick up a hitchhiker whose skin is much darker than most New Englanders. Maybe from the . . .

  A Crow’s Wisp by Joseph Monninger (Burkina Faso 1975-77) Wood Heat Publishing 321 pages January 2021 $4.99 (Kindle); $10.99 (Paperback)   Reviewed by Steve Foehr (Ethiopia 1965-67) • The crow has been a constant in eons of history, and a continuous thread through worldwide mythologies. In the Bible, the crow symbolizes divine providence. In China and Japan, crows are divine messengers, who show love and gratitude. For the ancient Celts, Romans, and Greeks, the crow could foretell the future. In the many Native American Crow Clans– Chippewa, Hopi, Absaroka, Tlingit, Pueblo, and many more tribes—the crow culture connects the past with the present and the future. Crows have the reputation for being gossipy, disobedient, curious, cautious, a bit stubborn, and want the world the way they want it. They are a trickster, a smart aleck, feared as the souls of people who had committed suicide, and harbingers of luck, . . .

   JFK & RFK Made Me Do It:  1960–1968 by Sweet William (WM Evensen) (Peru 1964–66) Peace Corps Writers & Constitutional Capers August 2021 274 pages $25.00 (paperback); $9.99 (Kindle) Reviewed by Marnie Mueller (Ecuador 1963-65) • I didn’t know what I was getting into when Marian Haley Beil asked me to review this book. My first thought was this would be a simple retelling of the Peace Corps experience and its aftermath. But JFK and RFK Made Me Do It: 1960 to 1968 is much more than that. In this recounting,  it becomes a young man’s sentimental education, akin to Gustave Flaubert’s novel of that title, though instead of  living through the revolution of 1848 and the founding of the Second French Empire, Sweet William takes us through the revolution wrought by JFK’s presidency and RFK’s attempt to carry on the calling of his fallen brother. JFK & RFK MADE . . .

  Elisabeth Samson, Forbidden Bride C.V. Hamilton (Suriname 1999-01) ‎Swift House Press June 2020 401 pages $17.95 (paperback), $3.99 (Kindle) Reviewed by Stephen Foehr (Ethiopia 1965-67) • Elisabeth Samson was a real person, a Free Negress. But members of her family remained in slavery, while others were bought out of enslavement, which is how Samson was born free in the 18th century Dutch colony of Suriname. The situation was ripe for drama and moral dilemma, especially with the addition of a Black/White love affair. And there is this twist: Elisabeth Samson was a rich plantation owner with hundreds of slaves, importer of luxury European goods, a Dutch colonial wannabe, whose greatest anguish was not being allowed to marry the love of her life, a white man, and that they had not conceived a child. C.V. Hamilton’s novel Elisabeth Samson, Forbidden Bride is based on Samson’s journals discovered by the author and . . .