I read Deborah Scroggins'
"Emma's War" while I was in Togo. Emma McCune was a young, beautiful British woman who came to Sudan as a relief worker and ended up marrying a rebel warlord.
I enjoyed the book but did so mostly because of its descriptions of Sudan. Scroggins is a journalist and it shows; the detail and in-depth explanations demonstrate the extensive research she did. It's very well written. I learnt a great deal more on the country's history: colonization, civil war, massacres and the horrific famines.

While Emma's story is interesting, it doesn't really merit an entire book. (In the book itself it says that Emma tried to get writers to help her with her autobiography. They responded with uninterest; one telling her, "There isn't anything there but a black man boffing a white woman.") Thankfully, Scroggins also recognized this. Instead, the book interweaves Emma's story with the history of Sudan as well as Scroggins' own experiences of reporting in the country. As a volunteer I was also interested in her examination of humanitarian work--why they come and how so often they try to do good but really only cause more damage.

Elisee writes:

La semaine derniere j'ai eu la rare opportunité de lire Sankara le rebelle (livre introuvable) qui est le récit de la très extraordinaire vie de Thomas Sankara, par le journaliste malgache Sennen Andriamirado. Un président qui fait de ''l'avions stop'' ou qui est incapable d'inviter des amis à manger parce que son frigo est vide ou qu'il n'a pas d'argent. Voici autant de réalités  et de privations auxquelles était confronté Sankara par souci d'économie pour les maigres caisses de l'Etat. Ces faits, l'auteur en était témoin, lui qui a eu la chance de partager des moments de vie de ce chef d'Etat hors pair dont il était aussi un ami. Sankara invitait les burkinabè à vivre selon les réalités du pays réel, c'est-à dire vivre en tenant compte des maigres ressources du pays. Sankara le rebelle c'est aussi l'histoire de l'évolution politique et sociale de la Haute Volta entre 1974 et 1986, pays qui a été rebaptisé Burkina Faso, ou ''pays des hommes intègres'' par le même Thomas Sankara. A lire !

Last week I had the rare opportunity to read "Sankara le rebelle" ( a book not found in stores); a story on the extraordinary life of Thomas Sankara, by the Malagasy journalist Sennen Andriamirado. A president who often "hitchhiked" on other presidents' planes and was unable to invite his friends over to eat because his own fridge was empty or he had no money. These were real deprivations that Sankara faced in respect toward the country's meager funds. These facts were witnessed by the author, who had the opportunity to share moments of life with this outstanding head of state as one of his good friends. Sankara invited the burkinabè to live by the realities of the country, meaning living in relation to the country's meager resources. "Sankara le rebelle" is also the story of the political and social evolution of Upper Volta from 1974 to 1986; the country was renamed Burkina Faso, or ''land of the upright people'' by the same Thomas Sankara. A book to be read!

For my "Economics of Gender in Developing Countries" class we read Unbowed, for SCU's sustainability day.  I assigned it on a whim, and dreaded that it was going to be terrible.  (By the way, Elliot and I have a new standard for worst non-fiction ever, Beck Weathers' Everest saga, Left for Dead: My Journey Home from Everest... just terrible... but as Elliot said, "Dad, he was left for dead, TWICE, on the summit... what do you think happened to his brain?")

Well, Unbowed was not terrible.  Quite a good read, in fact.  Not a great non-fiction memoir, but full of interesting observations on Kenyan society and anecdotes to make it a speedy read.  Oddly, you barely get a sense of Maathai's actual accomplishments.  She focuses much more on events that happened, spending many pages describing, for example, a protest in a gazetted forest, and only a couple sentences on the logistics of the organization she founded and nurtured, the Greenbelt Movement.  Her lengthy description of her childhood and her parents is a very nice introduction for students of how a relatively elite young women in colonial and post-colonial Africa would have grown up.  She is an activist, so there is not much philosophical reflection or analysis in the book (other than the, "Why can't we all be better" variety).  Come to think of it, I don't think she actually discusses any fiction or "big ideas" in the book.  She is one of those people that are always talking and doing.  Places like Kenya in the 1970s and 1980s, sinking into dictatorship and social instability,  need exactly that personality type.  So a thumbs up.  Not the best memoir, but a nice (and cheap, both in price and opportunity cost) read, especially for university students with no Africa experience who need a little inspiration.

I have read several books now, written by returned volunteers on their Peace Corps experience.
Some I really enjoyed, like George Packer's The Village of Waiting. (What a writer! Though I wish he went into more explanation as to why he quit after 18 months). Others, like Erdman's Nine Hills to Nambonkaha, I didn't like so much (The part where she complains about the village finally getting electricity...because it ruins her view of the stars? Please!!)

Yet no matter if I like or dislike the book, it's shocking how much I can relate to each of their experiences. It's like they are writing about my time in Pobé! I've found this to be true no matter the country, or even the time period (such the case for Packer's experience in Togo...in 1982-83!)

I was pleasantly surprised, though, when I read "Monique and the Mango Rains: Two Years with a Midwife in Mali," by Kris Holloway. Most books by PC authors are about their own experiences. But this book is different.  It's all about Monique and the author's friendship with her.

Monique was a village midwife. She only attended a few years of school yet she was a very intelligent and extremely hardworking woman devoted to the maternity clinic. Through Holloway's words we see the struggles of village life that Monique faced: The lack of respect she received by village elders because she was too young to be a midwife (she was 25) ;  The loveless marriage she had with her husband and her inability to get out of it ; that she couldn't collect her own salary (a man of the family collected it and gave her only a small amount).

Sadly Monique led a short life (this is not a spoiler, you find out she dies at the very beginning) but one that was uplifting and inspirational.

I didn't find this book to be particularly well-written, yet I found it hard to put down simply because of the story itself. I love that this book doesn't focus only on the authors PC experience but on her friendship with this incredible woman.

It's the story of Monique, seen through the eyes of Kris.

No matter how much you read or study, it's impossible for us as Americans to truly comprehend trying to survive civil war and genocide in countries like Rwanda or Burundi. Author Tracy Kidder, however, makes it very real.

His biography Strength in What Remains tells the story of Deogracias, a Tutsi from a small village in Burundi. After narrowly missing death during the country's ethnic genocides, Deo escapes to America. Broke, alone and unable to speak English, he struggles, living as a squatter in an abandoned building in Harlem and as a homeless man in Central Park.
With a mixture of hard work, determination and luck, Deo returns to school as a medical student at Columbia. After years of work and study he accomplishes his dream of creating Village Health Works, a nonprofit medical clinic in his native village.

This book is one that once you open, you can't put down. The most emotional and disturbing part, as you can no doubt imagine, is the recounting of Deo's horrifying journey of survival. Deo runs for four days, hiding from machete-clad militia men, unable to trust anyone, constantly stumbling over charred and decapitated bodies and barely escapes death on more than one occasion. When learning about a historical or current event, I've always been more interested in the personal accounts and experiences of persons who lived through the event. It's much more fascinating...and real...to me than reading an article or history book. While Kidder does go into some historical background, his main focus is on Deo; which is exactly what makes the book so powerful.
Throughout the story Kidder portrays Deo as an obviously shaken but strong and even optimistic man. I'm not a religious person, but I was struck by Deo's religious views, despite all the horrors he'd been through: 

"I do believe in God. I think God has given so much power to people, and intelligence, and said, 'Well, you are on your own. Maybe I'm tired, I need a nap. You are mature. Why don't you look after yourselves?'...And I think He's been sleeping too much."
One of my favorite books is another of Kidder's works, Mountains Beyond Mountains. In both works, the two men Kidder writes about can make any book interesting, yet it's impossible to deny Kidder's writing skills. The man knows how to tell a story!

Em

Just finished this book by Randall Bennett Wood. Excellent, though as Wood notes, there isn't nearly as much material to go on as he (and the reader) would have liked.  I hope someday soon a history PhD follows Wood's lead and takes up the period in Madagascar history and sheds more light on Waller's life.  Nice summary at blackpast.org

Born enslaved on January 12, 1850 in New Madrid County, Missouri, Waller became free during the Civil War and settled with his family on a farm in Tama County, Iowa. While working as a barber in Cedar Rapids, he studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1877, moving to Kansas a year later. There through the 1880s he acquired a string of barbershops, founded Lawrence's first black newspaper, and immersed himself in state politics. An active Republican, Waller championed values of middle-class thrift, racial uplift, and laissez-faire economics. His Kansas experience also seems to have convinced him that expanding frontiers offered opportunities for black progress, leading him to defend the "New Manifest Destiny" of the 1890s. After an abortive attempt to gain his party's nomination for state auditor, he obtained an appointment as U.S. consul to Madagascar in 1891. Waller spent three years with the consular service, during which time he explored the possibility of African-American colonization--a type of "Black Empire"--in Madagascar. In 1894, the native monarchy granted him a concession of 150,000 acres of rubber-rich land. This collided with the goals of French imperialists who had long eyed the island for its natural wealth. Following an invasion and subsequent treaty with the Malagasy government, French authorities repudiated the concession and arrested Waller as a spy, sentencing him to twenty years hard labor. "The Waller case" provoked outrage in the U.S. among black leaders and expansionary nationalists who pressured the Cleveland administration to protect the rights of American citizens abroad. After a ten-month incarceration during which his physical health greatly declined, Waller was released and returned to the U.S. During the Spanish American War, he served as an officer with the Twenty-Third Kansas Volunteers. Waller died of pneumonia in Yonkers, New York in October 1907.

Sources: Randall Bennett Wood, A Black Odyssey: John Lewis Waller and the Promise of American Life, 1878-1900 (Lawrence: Regents Press of Kansas, 1981).

From the blog vasigauke:

Naomi Benaron, a Munyori author, Wins the 2010 Bellwether Prize ($25 000)

Naomi Benaron, whose short story, "The Geology of Ghosts", recently appeared on Munyori Literary Journal, is the winner of the 2010 Bellwether Prize, worth $25 000. 00, for her novel manuscript Running the Rift, which is set in Rwanda. The Bellwether Prize of fiction, coordinated by Barbara Kingsolver, supports literature of social justice, and Naomi Benaron, whose works are set in Africa, particularly in Rwanda, is a perfect fit. And she is not new to literary awards; her debut collection of short stories, Love Letters from a Fat Man, won 2006 G.S. Sharat Chandra Prize for Fiction.I have read and enjoyed her work, including the manuscript of Running the Rift.

Barbara Kingsolver called the manuscript "culturally rich and completely engrossing. It engages the reader with complex political questions about ethnic animosity in Rwanda and so many other issues relevant to North American readers. For one, it conveys the impossibility of remaining neutral within a climate of broad moral compromise--even for purportedly apolitical institutions like the Olympics."

For more details, visit the Bellwether Prize website.

I've used this book of photos by Ed Kashi collected in Curse of the Black Gold: 50 Years of Oil in the Niger Delta for our Reading West Africa program.  The students are blown away by the images: A side of Africa that rarely gets to people in the U.S.  Michael Watts assembled a nice set of short essays by Nigerians involved in Delta politics and development.  Very educational and inspiring, in terms of "How can I realize my own highest humanity while doing good?"  The Guardian has a nice selection of some of the photos. 

I am currently reading "Community of Strangers, A Journal of Discovery in Uganda"
by A.F. Robertson, thanks to Michael Kevane's recommendation.  I am only a couple chapters in, but am thoroughly enjoying Robertson's day-to-day account as a young anthropologist during his first experience of field work and a newcomer in two newly-settled villages in Uganda. 

Next on my list of things to read is the latest collection of essays by Chinua Achebe in the book, "The Education of a British Protected Child."  Chris Blattman highlighted some of his favorite selections from the collection on his blog here.