The Foreign Service Journal, November 2008

John Graham shipped out on a freighter when he was 16 years old, took part in the first ascent of Mt. McKinley’s North Face (Wickersham Wall) at 20, and hitchhiked around the world at age 22, covering every war he found along the way as a stringer for the Boston Globe . With the Foreign Ser- vice, he was in the midst of the revolution in Libya and the war in Vietnam. Adventure was everything, each brush with death whetting his appetite for more. Then, as the author describes it, things changed, sometimes slowly, sometimes dramatically — such as during one tragic night at the height of a battle in Vietnam — and he began to question the road he was on. After leaving the Foreign Service in 1980, he has been involved in peacebuilding initiatives and, since 1983, has been a leader of the Giraffe Heroes Project (www.giraffe.org) , an international nonprofit organiza- tion moving people to stick their necks out for the common good. A Foreign Service officer from 1965 to 1980, John Graham served in Liberia, Libya, South Vietnam, Washington, D.C., and at the U.S. mission to the U.N. He is now president of the Giraffe Heroes Project and the author of Stick Your Neck Out: A Street-Smart Guide to Making a Difference in Your Community and Beyond (Berrett Koehler, 2006). His articles on cur- rent events appear in major publications and on the Internet. His memoir can be ordered online at http://johngrahamspeaker.org/sit-down-young-stran ger.html. A Great Adventure: Thirty Years in Diplomatic Service Carroll Russell Sherer, Stinehour Press, 2007, $20.00, paperback, 148 pages. In this highly readable memoir, Caroll Sherer shares her experiences as the wife of a diplomat and ambassador over the course of 30 years. From their first post in Morocco, the newly married couple N O V E M B E R 2 0 0 8 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 29