Kris Holloway

Interesting story of an Ohioan just out of college joins the Peace Corp and spends two years stationed in a remote village in Mali. She has a wonderful sincere open personality and you feel as if having spent time in Mali. There is a love interest, marriage, death and a mystery. For better and worse she experienced a traditional rural village before plastic, electricity and "progress" took over. The midwifery is brutal work, Mali has some of the highest death rates from birth (mother and child), and some of the highest birth rates in the world.… (more)

This is a well-written, engaging narrative of a Peace Corps workers time with a midwife in Mali. The ending is particularly moving. It is hard to say how much differently it would have affected me if I hadn't spent time with Peace Corps workers in a similarly third world country and in similarly "depraved" (by developed countries standards) rural communities. No electricity. No running water. No safe drinking water other than bottled. Squat toilets if any at all. And yet these communities have their Moniques, strong, intelligent, resourceful, persistent individuals who would be pillars of the community if they had been born in America, but would only be "welfare scum" if they tried to move to America.… (more)