The Foreign Service Journal, November 2009

30 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / N O V E M B E R 2 0 0 9 Civil Operations and Revolutionary Development Sup- port program in Vietnam, Dean quickly gained an un- derstanding of the American military and experience working in a war zone. A committed peacemaker, he brokered the deal that ended the war in Laos, and faced down an attempted coup d’etat against the Souvanna Phouma government there in 1973. As ambassador in Cambodia, he was the last man out on April 12, 1975, before Khmer Rouge forces moved to take over the city. As ambassador to Lebanon, where he was nearly assassinated in an am- bush, Dean reached out to all factions to promote the idea of one Lebanon. Danger Zones , part of the ADST Memoirs and Occasional Papers Series, is reviewed in this issue of the Journal (see p. 61). During a distinguished 30-year Foreign Service ca- reer, John Gunther Dean first served in Togo, followed by Mali, Vietnam and Laos. He was U.S. ambassador to Cambodia (1974-1975), Denmark (1975-1978), Lebanon (1978-1981), Thailand (1981-1985) and India (1985- 1989), after which he retired. He now lives in Paris. Foreign Service Family – Volume 3 Rita and Eric Youngquist, Voyageur PublishingCo., 2008, $17, paperback, 432 pages. This is the third and final in- stallment in the memoir of Rita and Eric Youngquist’s Foreign Service life. This chapter begins in 1962 as the family moves to Princeton, N.J., where FSO Eric Youngquist pursued his master’s degree in public policy over two years. Thereafter, the scene shifts to Washington, D.C., where he served as desk officer for Denmark and Norway from 1963 to 1967. While there, he attended night classes at The George Washington University Law School and served as editor of the law review. As in the first two volumes, the story of the family’s experience is told largely through excerpts from the late Rita Youngquist’s many letters to her parents. In this volume, Rita focused most of her efforts on re- decorating their home, educating their children and working as a nursery school teacher for a local church, in additional to representational activities, as the cou- ple sought to maintain their family life through the changes imposed by the Foreign Service. Eric V. Youngquist served in Bangkok from 1955 to 1957, first as vice consul, then as a commercial officer in the economic section, and later in the political section dealing with Southeast Asia Treaty Organization affairs. From 1958 to 1962, he was an economic officer in Helsinki. After two years at Princeton University, he was assigned in 1964 as desk officer for Denmark and Nor- way at the State Department. To purchase this book, contact him at 834 Lynnbrook Road, Nashville TN 37215. Jordan’s Jewish Drama Queen Lee-Alison Sibley, BookSurge Publishing, 2009, $18.99, paperback, 332 pages. A Jew walks into a school in Amman, Jordan, and asks for a job. It sounds like the setup for a horri- ble joke, but this is the story of Lee- Alison Sibley. Uprooted and drop- ped into a strange land, she recalls hardships familiar to many Foreign Service spouses. In Sibley’s case, she was determined to pursue her love of music and musical ed- ucation and, through the experience, comes to under- stand how we may all find peace, even in difficult circumstances. In 1997, Lee-Alison Sibley’s FSO husband, George, took a post in Jordan, turning her and her teenage son into a family-in-tow in a land antagonistic to their cul- ture. Undaunted, Sibley, an internationally renowned soprano, became head of the Performing Arts Depart- ment of an elite Jordanian school in which the majority of instructors and students were Arabs. Her story of forg- ing relationships and then withstanding her “outing” as a Jew is both intensely intimate and highly instructive for any Foreign Service family member transplanted to a challenging post. Lee-Alison Sibley holds a master’s degree in music and education and has performed and taught music around the world. She was named the Rotary Club’s 2004 Woman of the Year in Kolkata, India. She lives in Great Falls, Va., is the mother of two sons, and seeks to continue her mission of spreading music education worldwide. Sweet Magnolias and English Lavender: An Anglo-American Romance James O’Donald Mays, New Forest Leaves, 2008, $36, paperback, 464 pages. While this memoir spans such perennially fascinat- ing topics as life in the Deep South, conditions during World War II and Foreign Service life in Cold War–era Europe, Mays’ story is, above all, a testament to the