Peace Corps Worldwide – Page 335 – promoting Peace Corps writers since 1989

First Peace Corps Horror Novel!

Dec 21 2011

The Peace Corps in its long history has attracted more than a few non-RPCVs to write about us! Most of the books have been non-fiction, and serious attempts at evaluating the worth and worthiness of what we are all trying to do. I’m thinking of Robert Textor’s Cultural Frontiers of the Peace Corps, MIT Press, (1966) and All You Need is Love: The Peace Corps and the Spirit of the 1960, Harvard University Press, (1998.) Then there are the novels! One of my favorite is by Tama Janowitz, entitled A Cannibal in Manhattan about an RPCV who brings her cannibal husband home to New York City, with dire consequences for all. (Crown 1987). There are other novels. Carter Coleman’s The Volunteer, published in 1998 and set in East Africa; Richard Dooling’s masterful White Man’s Grave, from Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1998. That is set in West Africa! Most of the early “Peace . . .

The Peace Corps Returns to Colombia

Dec 20 2011

PCVs have returned to Colombia, the first full-time Volunteers since 1981 when the program was suspended due to security. Colombia was one of the first programs launched by the agency, beginning in the summer/fall of 1961. The current PCVs were sworn in on December 14, 2011. The push to return to Colombia was started by the large, active and forceful lobbying of the Friends of Colombia RPCVs who, with the support of the Colombian government, last year since Peace Corps Crisis Corps Volunteers, now known as Response Volunteers, back for short term assignments. These 22 new and full time PCVs will go to teaching English assignments in schools in Santa Marta, Cartagenia, and Barranquilla. Today there are also two Response Volunteers working in-country with the Community Development office as Disaster Relief Specialists, assigned to rural areas that have been affected by the recent floods. Attending the swearing-in ceremony were two RPCVs from the early years, both . . .

Bonnie Black Wins Gourmand International Awards

Dec 19 2011

Bonnie Lee Black (Gabon 1996-98) author of How to Cook a Crocodile: A Memoir with Recipes– the first book published by the Peace Corps Writers Book imprint!– who is also a blogger on this site at: Cooking Crocodiles & Other Food Musings has just received three prestigious awards from Gourmand International. Her book’s awards were in the categories of Food Literature, African Cuisine (Gabon), and Charity and Community (North America). The 16-year-old organization Gourmand International, headquartered in Madrid, Spain, publishes GOURMAND magazine and sponsors the Gourmand World Cookbooks Awards, held in a different world capital each year. The 2011 awards will be presented on March 6, 2012, at the Folies Bergère in Paris, kicking off the weeklong Paris Cookbook Fair. Black plans to attend the awards ceremony and book fair in Paris. Among the organization’s stated objectives are “to reward and honor those who cook with words,” and “to increase knowledge of, and respect for, food . . .

Review of Larry Brown's Peasants Come Last

Dec 16 2011

Peasants Come Last: A Memoir of the Peace Corps at Fifty by J. Larry Brown (India late 1960s) Lucita Publisher $12.99 (paperback), $9.99 (Kindle) 174 pages September 2011 Reviewed by Ken Hill (Turkey 1965–67) A DENSELY POPULATED, complex and important African country, Uganda suffers from a history of violence reflected in names like Idi Amin, Milton Obote and the Lord’s Resistance Army. Peace Corps has entered Uganda three times and left twice since the ’60s. Currently, some 175 PCVs serve in Uganda supported by a staff of 30+. Dr. J. Larry Brown became the Uganda Country Director in late 2008. Peasants Come Last is a punchy and compelling narrative of his latest Peace Corps experience, providing a chilling perspective of the significant challenges faced by Peace Corps in such a post. The book applauds and honors Peace Corps Volunteers and staff in Uganda, explaining the worrisome dangers that must be . . .

Merry Christmas from the United Arab Emirates

Dec 16 2011

[In our series of blogs from RPCVs around the world, we have this update from the United Arab Emirates and Darcy Munson Meijer (Gabon 1982-84) who lives now with her family in Abu Dhabi and teaches English at Zayed University. She recently published Adventures in Gabon: Peace Corps Stories from the African Rainforest, a collection of the best stories submitted by Gabon RPCVs to the quarterly “Gabon Letter.” We asked Darcy how the world looked from her side of the world this Holiday Season.] • IT’S WINTER NOW, so the weather is ideal: clear, sunny and in the mid-60s to 70s Fahrenheit. We are on winter break at Zayed University where I teach and at my children’s schools, and my family and I will spend 2 of the 3 weeks in Greece! We’ll divide our time between Athens and Crete. The abiity to travel in the region is one of the nicest parts of living in . . .

In some ways, she is the most famous RPCV of us all

Dec 15 2011

The Death Notice Reads: Heffron, Margery M. 73, of Exeter, N.H. on Friday, Dec. 9 of cancer. Until her death, she was at work on a biography of Louisa Catherine Adams, wife of the sixth U.S. president. She was a graduate of Smith College and earned a master of arts degree from Columbia University. She was press secretary to Rep. Edward J. Markey, 1979-80; associate director for media relations at the Harvard University News Office, 1981-89; and associate vice president for university relations at Binghamton University (SUNY), 1989-95. A native of Foxboro and a longtime resident of Westwood, she is survived by her husband of 49 years, Frank H. Heffron; daughter Anne Heffron (Chris) Sigler of Palo Alto, Calif.; sons John Heffron of Providence, R.I., and Samuel (Ashley) Heffron of Kittery Point, Me.; three grandchildren: Keats Iwanaga of Los Gatos and Palo Alto, Calif.; and William and Phineas Heffron of Kittery . . .

Hessler Writes About Egypt in current New Yorker

Dec 15 2011

The New Yorker in the December 19 & 26, 2011 issue has a long insightful piece by Peter Hessler (China 1996-98) entitled “The Mosque on the Square” Two weeks inside the Egyptian revolution. You can find it on page 46. As many of us know, Peter, his wife, and their toddler twins, are living now in Cairo where Peter is reporting on that nation’s Arab Spring for The New Yorker and for all of us. In November of this year, Peter sent us a quick report from Egypt; it was shortly after his family arrived in-country. Once again, our website www.peacecorpsworldwide.org is ahead of the Times, on top of the News, and before the New Yorker when it comes to keeping track of RPCV writers! Here’s what Peter had to say a month ago. (But you may also want to read his longer piece in the current issue of the . . .

Volunteers — The Movie. The Subplots. The RPCV.

Dec 14 2011

In James Jouppi’s (Thailand 1971–73) long, rambling and detailed memoir — Wars of Hearts And Minds — about his time in-country in Thailand and readjusting to the U.S. — there are a seven pages, 565 to 572, that focus on the cult (to some people) movie, Volunteers released in 1985. For those who missed Volunteers this is briefly the plot: Lawrence Bourne III, played by young Tom Hanks, is a spoiled rich kid in the 1960 with a large gambling debt. After his father, Lawrence Bourne Jr. (George Plimpton), refuses to pay his son’s debt, Lawrence escapes his angry debtors by trading places with his college roommate Kent (Xander Berkeley) and jumps on a Peace Corps flight to Southeast Asia. In the Peace Corps Lawrence is assigned to build a bridge for the local villagers, working with two other PCVs: Washington State University graduate Tom Tuttle (John Candy) and the beautiful, down-to earth . . .

Review of Tyler McMahon's (El Salvador 1999-02) How The Mistakes Were Made

Dec 13 2011

How The Mistakes Were Made Tyler McMahon (El Salvador 1999-02) St. Martin’s Press 342 pages $14.99 (paperback), $26.99 (hardcover), $9.99 (Kindle) October 2011 Reviewed by Tony D’Souza (Ivory Coast 2000-02, Madagascar 2002-03) TYLER MCMAHON HAS TAPPED the history of underground rock music and its most tragic players to craft a moving tale of art, fame, passion, love, and the blind drive to leave a legacy no matter the cost to the artist during his or her lifetime. Centering on the rise of the fictional “The Mistakes,” a two-man, one-woman grunge band at the forefront of the early ’90’s Pacific Northwest music revolution, How The Mistakes Were Made‘s double entendre title perfectly describes what the novel is about: the rise of the band from obscurity to worldwide fame, but also the literal mistakes made by the band members as they explore love with one another. Ultimately, the life-mistakes they make as . . .

Robert Textor Remembers Writing the In-Up-and-Out Memo

Dec 12 2011

Fifty Years Ago Today, Sunday, December 11, 2011 Today I find myself reminiscing about this day fifty years ago, when I was serving as the first full-time cultural anthropologist in Peace Corps/ Washington. I had begun my consulting role the previous June, at the request of various officials of the then-fledgling organization. Since I was a Thailand specialist, my original assignment was to help plan the training program for Thailand One. Pretty soon, however, “mission creep” set in, and I was working on other assignments as well — notably for the Talent Search, to find linguistically, culturally, and otherwise qualified people to serve overseas as ” Peace Corps Representatives,” or “Reps.” By December, 1961, after six months of the most frenetic work imaginable, it had become clear to me that I ought to plan to leave soon, and return to academic life. (I had a nice grant waiting to be . . .

How to Sell your e-book

Dec 12 2011

In The Wall Street Journal (Friday, December 8, 2011) I read an article about Darcie Chan, a full-time lawyer who drafts environmental legislation during the day and at night, after she has put her toddler son to bed, writes novels. Finishing her first novel, and after dozens of publishers and more than 100 literary agents rejected, she had a decision to make: quit writing or get published someway. Not giving up, and reading about e-book publishing, she decided to publish the book herself and went ahead and bought some ads on Web sites that target e-book readers, paid for a few reviews, and priced the book at .99 cents. She has (so far) sold more than 400,000 copies. What gives? According to the Association of American Publishers digital self-publishing has serious drawbacks. While e-books are the fastest-growing segment of the book market, they still make up less than 10% of overall trade book . . .

Review of Jack Kennedy, Elusive Hero by Chris Matthews

Dec 09 2011

Jack Kennedy, Elusive Hero by Chris Matthews (Swaziland 1968-70) Simon & Schuster 496 pages $27.50 (hardback); $26.39 (audio cd) November 2011 Reviewed by Don Schlenger (Ethiopia 1966-68) I WAS A SENIOR in a suburban,New Jersey high school when John F. Kennedy was elected President in 1960. Staunchly Presbyterian and Republican like my parents and many of my classmates, I was sure that the White House would soon become Vatican West. Six years later, my wife, Jackie, and I were on a charter flight to Addis Ababa to begin our two year service as Peace Corps Volunteers in Ethiopia. As I made my way through Chris Matthews’ new book, Jack Kennedy, Elusive Hero, I was able, after almost five decades, to formulate answers to Matthews’ questions, ‘What was he like?” and “How did he do it?” I’m not sure why, after five decades, these questions were important to me, but I do know, . . .

The Peace Corps' First Book About the Peace Corps

Dec 08 2011

In the mid-sixties, the Peace Corps as an agency realized that they had a lot of Volunteer stories that they could use for Recruitment so the Office of Public Information, as it was then called, began its own publications. In September 1968 they published The Peace Corps Reader with the declaimer, “The opinions expressed in the Peace Corps Reader are those of the authors and may or may not coincide with official Peace Corps policy.” Ain’t that the truth! This Peace Corps book, which, by the way, was given away free as a government publication, republished several copyrighted pieces including Jack Vaughn’s “Now We are Seven” published in 1968 in the Saturday Review; and Sargent Shriver’s 1966 essay, also published in the Saturday Review, “Five Years with the Peace Corps.” There was “The Quiet-mouth American” by Donald Lloyd, published in 1963 in Harper’s Magazine. Lloyd was the founder of Resources Development . . .

Reports of My Death:Beyond-the-Grave Confessions of North American Writers

Dec 08 2011

This isn’t the Christmas Season or the Holiday Season as much as it is the Season of Big Books by RPCVs! Having received last week: War of Hearts and Mind: An American Memoir, which comes in at 618 pages and written by James Jouppi (Thailand 1971-73), this week in the mail came: Reports of My Death: Beyond-the-Grave Confessions of North American Writers by Girard R. Christmas (Thailand 1973-76; Western Samoa 1976-78). This tome is 660 pages! Both of these books are self-published. And, by the way, what’s with these Thailand RPCVs? Do they have too much time on their hands and that is why they are writing such long books? Reports of My Death, aka, ROMD, is the labor of love of Gerry Christmas. It took him twenty years to research and write. “As a teenager,” he wrote me, “I always hated the way authors were presented in textbooks. Reports of . . .

First Book About RPCVS

Dec 07 2011

Before there were Returned Peace Corps Volunteers there were books about them. In the very early days of the agency everyone was caught up with enthusiasm for these young Idealists going off on their own to do good in Africa, Asia and Latin America. To the best of my knowledge, the first book–paperback, of course, and selling for .50$ (those were the days)–was published by Paperback Library and done with the ‘full’ cooperation of the agency. It is entitled simply, The Peace Corps. Sargent Shriver wrote the Introduction and the photographs were taken by Rowland Sherman and Paul Conklin, the first two great photographers of the Peace Corps. There is one photo in particular that I remember. It was taken of my roommate, Ernie Fox (Ethiopia 1962-64). He is with children of whose parents who were in the leprosarium outside of Addis Ababa. We would go out of town on Saturday mornings to play games . . .