I hadn’t counted on National Cleanup Day. A country with no garbage pickup—no recycling. On windy days plastic bags swirl like leaves. But not on National Cleanup Day. The only vehicles on the roads belong to police, or the military or politicians. Everyone else is ordered to remain at home, sweeping one’s compound of trash. […]
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A few days among the Mende in Sierra Leone
This is a “live” post from Sumbuya, Sierra Leone. I ask your forgiveness for spelling or grammatical errors—I’m in an NGO office, the lights are blinking and, well—this is going to be one draft only. I’m here to tidy up loose ends. Tomorrow I’ll attend the opening of the school that our family and friends […]
Press Release about My Heart Is Not My Own
Penguin Canada to publish My Heart Is Not My Own September 26, 2012 (Toronto) – Penguin Canada is thrilled to announce the acquisition of Michael Wuitchik’s compelling novel, My Heart Is Not My Own (previously Three Stone Fire), set to publish in Summer 2013. The book was acquired in a competitive bid by Penguin’s Commissioning […]
Passion Play in the Serengeti
Two million animals in search of the tall grasses. An endless circle, with no beginning And no end. Languid walks along the plains, The sweet grasses disappearing within days of their coming, The relentless movement of wildebeest The life-force of the Serengeti. A passion play of hunters and hunted, Repeating through the millennia. At the […]
Back to the beginning….
Thanks to my agent, Drea Cohane, My Heart Is Not My Own is finally getting into the hands of acquiring editors. And so my thoughts return to the beginning…. In 2000, during the civil war in Sierra Leone, I visited a refugee camp in Freetown. I remember several images from that trip, but one in […]
A walk unspoiled….
‘We are making palm oil,’ Christian says, ‘would you like to see?’ He leads me through a landscape of palm, elephant grass, and smoky patches of last week’s slash and burn. Young girls from the village, Beautiful faces, giggles, hands waving like flags. You snap me! You snap me! Christian points to a tree that […]