reviews - ERIC MADEEN

Review of Water Drumming in the Soul By Mark Walker

Although Madeen is a fellow Returned Peace Corps writer, I never heard of him until he reviewed my latest book, The Guatemala Reader, and commented on my video about the book's making. Initially, I thanked him and asked him how he liked living in Texas (his university is listed as TCU—Texas Christian University)—but much to my surprise, he's an adjunct professor of modern literature at Tokyo City University in Japan.

I was impressed with a note from one of the great travel writers and a fellow Returned Peace Corps Volunteer, Paul Theroux sent him. He said he was mystified by Japan and:

…I have been to Japan several times. Still, to me, being there is baffling, obviously because I don't speak the language and because the inner life of Japan seems to me highly complex, strenuously protected, a nesting box of secrets. I have only written about the surfaces there – and unlike other cultures, Japanese surfaces don't reveal their inner state. So, I am counting on you to write the ultimate book on the inner life of Japan!

Madeen must have taken his comments seriously as he published a Japanese immigration book: Tennis Clubbed, Snubbed, and Rubbity Dub Dubbed. His most recent book is Tokyo-ing!

I've stayed in touch with Madeen and directed him to someone who can help with some marketing and website development needs. One of the joys of writing is getting to know other authors.

I started with his book, which is about Africa. I've worked and lived in West Africa, and it brought back memories of this fascinating part of the world. The book begins with a chance encounter between a Peace Corps Volunteer (PCV) and a stunning young local girl bathing nude in a pool. He is captivated by her water drumming, playing the stream as a drum. The PCV, David, is tasked with setting up a dispensary in the village where the young girl, Assam, lives. The descriptions of the challenges of cross-cultural relationships and health hazards of tropical Africa are unforgettable, not to mention some steamy love scenes and the tension between them that never dissipates.

Several hilarious scenes kept me laughing throughout the book, starting with his PCV "To Do" list:

Remember that cement begins to set in its sack in only 1 week (the clock is ticking).
So, haul ass
Hands off, local ass
Laugh (beats crying)

I had to chuckle when Assam served David a plate of manioc and monkey meat—his eyes widened. This must have looked like me in West Africa when eating monkey stew at the inauguration of a local school and, just as I was finishing, was confronted with a monkey hand.

Madeen's graphic descriptions of various tropical ailments also struck home, such as when "I saw a filaria worm swim before my eye on a fantastic voyage through my body," the ulcers and sores that polka-dotted his legs and "the rattle of loose teeth."

I'll never forget the distant drums and chants I heard up country in Sierra Leone. Madeen sets the stage for some of the local traditions, including fetishes:

She found the one with the mark on the trunk in the grove of trees. The fruit bats were silent as she used the machete to dig up the tin holding her fetish; she took out a prickly bundle of eagle feathers, stuck in a ball of wax, draped with red and white. Then, she held it up while calling down the line of ancestors to get to the spirit world, pleading that they help find him. She rocked back and forth, chanting the image of David's face in her mind.

This unclassifiable author is worth checking out!