The Orange Tree

Whose war is it when they are shooting at you?

Burkina Faso and Mali in the 1980s, two countries in an uneasy relationship marked by spasms of violence, are the backdrop for this tale of descent and, possibly, redemption. An American follows his Peace Corps girlfriend to West Africa but finds something wildly different from what he had expected, ending up staying for four years amid the chaos of a changing continent.

Starting in the coastal nation of Togo before moving up into the Sahel and into the towns at the edge of the Sahara itself, this tale takes Paul Cassamude through loss and learning to the point of leaving, showing the dangers of expatriate life in third-world countries as well as possibilities found there for personal growth.