Peace Corps writers

1
“How to Write a Memoir” by Bonnie Black (Gabon 1996-98)
2
THE SHOWGIRL AND THE WRITER by Marnie Mueller (Ecuador)
3
I Shall Not Want | by Andrea Elise (South Korea)
4
“The Bed on the Roof” by Bonnie Black (Gabon)
5
Garrard Conley (Ukraine) — author of BOY ERASED winner of a Macdowell Fellowship
6
SILENT LIGHT | A new novel by Mark Jacobs (Paraguay)
7
Joseph Monninger (Burkina Faso) — GOODBYE TO CLOCKS TICKING
8
WORDS CREATE WORLDS: Poems by Ada Jo Mann (Chad)
9
“Test Preparation Authority” Lin Lougheed (Turkey)
10
WAYWARD GUILT by H.M.S. Brown (Bulgaria)
11
“A Road Not Taken” by Jamie Kirkpatrick (Tunisia)
12
New books by Peace Corps writers | May — June 2023
13
SOFTBALL, SNAKES, SAUSAGE FLIES AND RICE | Philip Fretz (Sierra Leone)
14
KEEPER OF THE STARS by Don Dirnberger (West Indies)
15
Bob Vila (Panama) remembers “This Old House“

“How to Write a Memoir” by Bonnie Black (Gabon 1996-98)

If I were still teaching Creative Nonfiction Writing at the University of New Mexico in Taos, I would assign this book to my students to read and study carefully, because I think it’s an excellent example of contemporary memoir writing done well. Some people, I’ve found, confuse memoirs with autobiographies. To clarify: Autobiographies are stories of a life – written by (or ghost-written for) famous people who have a built-in following. Their fans have a deep-seated curiosity: How in the world did she (or he) become so famous? So they’re willing to follow that person’s story from cradle to however close to the grave this celeb might now be — all the ups and downs of that person’s life that led to their enviable fame. Memoirs, on the other hand, are stories from a life. Not the whole life story, but rather the life-changing part or parts, drawn from the life of a regular, ordinary . . .

Read More

THE SHOWGIRL AND THE WRITER by Marnie Mueller (Ecuador)

  The Showgirl and the Writer: A Friendship Forged in the Aftermath of the Japanese American Incarceration by Marnie Mueller (Ecuador 1963-65) Peace Corps Writers 488 pages July 2023 $16.95 (Paperback) The Showgirl and the Writer, A Friendship Forged in the Aftermath of the Japanese American Incarceration, by Marnie Mueller, is a hybrid memoir/biography. It encompasses Mueller’s own story, beginning at her birth to Caucasian parents in the Tule Lake Japanese American High Security Camp in Northern California, and tells the tale of her long friendship with Mary Mon Toy, a Nisei performer who was incarcerated in the Minidoka Japanese American Camp in Idaho during WWII. The two met by chance in 1994. By then Mueller was a published author and Mary Mon Toy by necessity of old age, had retired from an unusually successful career on stage and television, for an Asian American actor of her time. After Ms. . . .

Read More

I Shall Not Want | by Andrea Elise (South Korea)

I Shall Not Want Poems Andrea Elise (South Korea ) Create Space Publishing February 2015 46 pages $6.95 (Paperback) This is a collection of poems that express love, friendship, regret, loss, gratitude, vanity. It also includes a number of haikus and an essay about one day in the life of a young woman’s 2-year stint in the Peace Corps in South Korea in the late 1970’s. Andrea Elise was born in Sopron, Hungary and immigrated to the United States with her parents in 1956. She grew up in Amarillo, and attended Amarillo College before transferring to Duke University, where she earned a Bachelor’s degree in English Literature. She spent two years in the Peace Corps in South Korea, then obtained a Master’s degree in Counseling from West Texas A&M University. Her interests include writing essays and poetry, partner dancing  (East Coast swing or jitterbug), playing mandolin, hiking, working out and . . .

Read More

“The Bed on the Roof” by Bonnie Black (Gabon)

(The following story is excerpted from  the Mali memoir of Bonnie Black, How To Make An African Quilt: The Story of the Patchwork Project of Segon, Mali)   By Bonnie Black (Gabon 1996-98) • One afternoon, on the way homefrom teaching a [patchwork quilting] class at Centre Benkady, I stopped at a metalworker’s atelier to ask whether he might make an iron ladder for me that could be attached securely to the front terrace of my house, allowing me to have access to the flat roof. The man, Mr. Dao, agreed, and within a few weeks the sturdy, narrow ladder was installed. Then, as if heaven-sent one Monday morning I saw  on my way to the centreville marché, but not yet far from my home, a Malian family from an outlying village conveying on their donkey cart a new, hand-made traditional bed frame made of smooth sticks tied with cowhide . . .

Read More

Garrard Conley (Ukraine) — author of BOY ERASED winner of a Macdowell Fellowship

Garrard Conley |Assistant Professor of Creative Writing   Garrard Conley (Ukraine 2007-10) has been awarded a prestigious MacDowell Fellowship that he will engage in during two weeks in late September 2023. Adding his name to a list that includes one of his literary heroes, James Baldwin, Conley’s name can now be found among illustrious artists such as Willa Cather, Leonard Bernstein, and Nell Painter, all of whom are past recipients. Conley expressed his shock and gratitude at becoming a MacDowell Fellowship recipient saying, “I was so thrilled that I almost didn’t even have a reaction. I didn’t know what to do.” He started applying for this fellowship when he was 21 and had been applying every eligible year since “thinking, there’s no way I’ll ever get in, but I’m just going to do it.” The MacDowell Fellowship was established in 1907 by Marian and Edward MacDowell and was initially funded . . .

Read More

SILENT LIGHT | A new novel by Mark Jacobs (Paraguay)

  Silent Light by Mark Jacobs (Paraguay 1978-80) OB Books October 2023 340 pages $18.95 (Paperback)   At the start of Mark Jacob’s remarkable new novel ― his first book in thirteen years ― thirty-seven-year-old Smith wins a “stash” of diamonds in a poker game. The only catch: he has to find them. A Louisiana native, Smith is currently employed on an oil platform off the west coast of Africa, while the diamonds are somewhere in the immense, war-torn Democratic Republic of the Congo. But Smith’s grown tired of the platform and he hates the idea of wasting a full house. One last adventure, he tells himself, and then, diamonds or no diamonds, he’s heading home to Louisiana. In Kinshasa, Smith meets a young woman named Béatrice, who hails from a village on the other side of the country. But this village, she tells Smith, is where his diamonds are . . .

Read More

Joseph Monninger (Burkina Faso) — GOODBYE TO CLOCKS TICKING

  Goodbye to Clocks Ticking By Joseph Monninger (Burkina Faso 1975–77) Steerforth Publishing March. 2023 208 pages $9.99 (Kindle); $16.99 (Hardcover), (Audiobook) An uplifting journey of truly seeing and appreciating what makes life worth living in the year following a terminal diagnosis • Goodbye to Clocks Ticking is an unforgettable book that tells the story of a singular year of challenges, insights, and peculiar gifts. It is also a sort of postcard from a place many of us will one day visit. After thirty-two years of teaching, Joe Monninger, an avid outdoorsman in robust health, was looking forward to a long retirement with the love of his life in a cabin beside a New England estuary. Three days after his last class, however, he’s diagnosed with terminal lung cancer, even though he has not smoked for more than 30 years. It was May, and he might be dead by early fall. Soon . . .

Read More

WORDS CREATE WORLDS: Poems by Ada Jo Mann (Chad)

  Words Create Worlds: Poems Ada Jo Mann  (Chad 1967-69) Peace Corps Writers 147 pages April 2023 $14.99 (paperback) Words Create Worlds is a collection of poems that span the life of the author, Ada Jo Mann,  who grew up in Detroit, Michigan, and who was a Peace Corps volunteer in Chad from 1967-69. Her Peace Corps service led to a career in international development which took her to many countries around the world where she focused on building strong communities and organizations using a strength-based approach to change called Appreciative Inquiry. Upon the author’s retirement, she began taking courses at the independent bookstore, Politics and Prose, in Washington, DC. As a participant in the Poetry Circle she was inspired to try her hand at poetry and this collection of her poems was the result. In addition to the international focus of her poems, the author writes about memories of . . .

Read More

“Test Preparation Authority” Lin Lougheed (Turkey)

  Dr. Lin Lougheed (Turkey 1968-70) is universally recognized as the leading authority in test preparation. As a best-selling author he has helped millions of English language learners prepare for the IELTS, TOEFL, and TOEIC exams. In addition to his test preparation books, teachers around the world in middle schools through university use his books to teach listening, reading, writing, and speaking skills. Dr. Lougheed started his EFL career in 1968 as a Peace Corps volunteer in Turkey. He earned his doctorate in International Educational Development a joint program of the School of International Affairs, Columbia University and Teachers College, Columbia University. He has received two Fulbright awards: a scholar grant in Sri Lanka and a professor grant in Tunisia. In 1983, he founded Instructional Design International, Inc. to develop English teaching materials in all media. Lin is a past member of the TESOL Executive Board, and has served as . . .

Read More

WAYWARD GUILT by H.M.S. Brown (Bulgaria)

  H.M.S. Brown (Yes – her real initials!) is an avid knitter, crocheter, and a voracious reader who stumbled into writing during lockdown in 2020 after complaining to her mom about a book she didn’t like. When her mom challenged her to write her own, the small town of Grant’s Crossing, Ohio, was born. H.M.S. Brown is a graduate of both Indiana University and The Ohio State University, as well as a returned Peace Corps volunteer,(Bulgaria 2001-02) so be prepared to see occasional mentions of the Hoosiers, the Buckeyes, and all things Bulgarian within her novels. She lives in central Ohio, doing the bidding of her evil, yet adorable cat, Michonne, along with keeping a day job to maintain a roof over her books and yarn stash. Wayward Guilt is H.M.S. Brown’s debut novel and Book 1 of her Heroes of Grant’s Crossing series. • Wayward Guilt H.M.S. Brown (Bulgaria . . .

Read More

“A Road Not Taken” by Jamie Kirkpatrick (Tunisia)

A Road Not Taken Jamie   Kirkpatrick (Tunisia 1970-72; APCD 1974-76) June 6, 2023 •   Now that I am of a certain age, I’m giving myself permission to occasionally recount a story that has been locked away in my personal vault. This is one of those times… It was nearly fifty years ago, and I was working on the staff of the Peace Corps in Tunisia. (I had previously served as a Volunteer in that country, but that’s another story.) One day, word reached me that a Volunteer who was under my supervision was absenting himself from his job, ostensibly taking some time to watch a movie that was being filmed at a location out in the desert, not far from his work site. It would be a long drive, but I thought this would be a good time to go visit some of my Volunteers in the south. . . .

Read More

New books by Peace Corps writers | May — June 2023

  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 from your purchase that will help support the site and the annual Peace Corps Writers awards. We include a brief description for each of the books listed here in hopes of encouraging readers  to order a book and/or  to VOLUNTEER TO REVIEW IT.  See a book you’d like to review for Peace Corps Worldwide? Send a note to Marian at marian@haleybeil.com, and she will send you a free copy along with a few instructions. P.S. In addition to the books listed below, I have on my shelf a number of other books whose authors would love for you to review. Go to Books Available for Review to see what is on that shelf. Please, please join in our . . .

Read More

SOFTBALL, SNAKES, SAUSAGE FLIES AND RICE | Philip Fretz (Sierra Leone)

Softball, Snakes, Sausage Flies and Rice: Peace Corps Experience in 1960s Sierra Leone by Philip Fretz (Sierra Leone 1962-64) Self Published January 2014 148 pages $0 (Kindle); $5.99 (Paperback) Just a few months out of student life on the rolling green lawns of Haverford College, Philip Fretz was living in a small, remote West African city amid insect invasions, deadly snakes and coups. It was the tumultuous 1960s, in both the United States and Africa, and he had become an early recruit to the Peace Corps, founded in 1961. He was the first volunteer to be sent to teach English at the Kenema Technical Institute in Sierra Leone, a former British colony that had been left in stark poverty and underdevelopment when colonialism ended. Half a century later, he began to pore through the diaries he had kept, sporadically, during those two years in Kenema. When his father died in . . .

Read More

KEEPER OF THE STARS by Don Dirnberger (West Indies)

  Keeper of the Stars is the first volume of poems from the series Making My Dreams Reality by Donald Drinberger. The words began before his trip to El Salvador but continued and finished while doing a Global Village Build with Habitat for Humanity International and HFH El Salvador. The members of the team, the people of the country of El Salvador, the families who wanted to construct their new homes with the understanding that a home is the starting point of a better life and a better world, to them and for them. In these words, these poems may you also share time with fellow human beings in changing this world for the betterment of all, one home at a time. The author, Donald Dirnberger (West Indies 1977-79), lives now on the Grey Wolf Resort and Ranch near Victor, Colorado where he enjoys gardening, raising animals, along with writing. . . .

Read More

Bob Vila (Panama) remembers “This Old House“

Bob Vila (Panama 1969-70) The project manager turned television host built home renovation entertainment. by KAREN HERMAN There was a time before home improvement shows existed, but a likeable project manager named Bob Vila changed that. After Vila restored his own Boston home and was asked to host a local television show to explain the process, the public’s interest in home renovation was unleashed and a new category of entertainment was born. For nearly thirty years Vila hosted multiple shows, starting with This Old House on PBS, then moving on to Bob Vila’s Home Again, Bob Vila and Restore America with Bob Vila. In the nineties, Vila appeared as a guest on the ABC comedy Home Improvement, acting along Tim Allen as a TV handyman. Today Vila’s videos are popular on YouTube and can also be seen at his website, BobVila.com. Vila was awarded a Daytime Emmy lifetime achievement award in 2022, and he’s also the author . . .

Read More

Copyright © 2022. Peace Corps Worldwide.