52 NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2025 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL This past spring the four authors, spread across the globe, were sent a common set of questions regarding their paths to publication. Their email responses were collected over the summer months and collated for this article. e David K. Wessel: Have you always wanted to be a writer? Matthew Algeo: I was always a good writer and not cut out for manual labor, so it seemed a natural course. I majored in folklore in college, a sure sign I wouldn’t be pursuing a career in, say, chemical engineering. After college I drifted into journalism, mainly working as a reporter at public radio stations all over the United States. I sold my first book in the spring of 2005. I signed the contract, and that night my wife and I went out to celebrate. We awoke groggily the next morning. Allyson checked her email. The State Department was offering her a spot in the next A-100 class. Our lives were upended in the course of a day! She accepted the offer, and we moved to Washington, D.C., for training. Over the next 20 years, we would live in Bamako, Rome, Ulaanbaatar, Maputo, Sarajevo, and Gaborone. Along the way I would write eight books. Matthew Becker: I never considered being a writer until my late 20s. My writing career is entirely based on my love of reading and a random thought one summer that since I had read enough thrillers, I could come up with a plot of my own. I decided that I might as well write it and see. Flash forward a few years, and here we are! Derek Corsino: Writing a book was never on my “things I must do” list, but it began to creep up as something I as an educator wanted to do. Tomoko Horie: Three years ago, I left my corporate job and became a freelancer. Since then, I started wanting to make writing my profession; I wanted to write a book. Now, I am working as a writer. Wessel: Where did the idea for your first book come from? Algeo: I write nonfiction, so all my books have been based on true stories, usually some small event that illuminates a larger issue. For example, Harry Truman’s Excellent Adventure tells the story of a road trip that Harry and Bess Matthew Algeo COURTESY OF MATTHEW ALGEO Matthew Becker COURTESY OF MATTHEW BECKER Author Matthew Algeo signing books at the Harry S. Truman Presidential Library and Museum, Independence, Missouri, November 14, 2023. COURTESY OF MATTHEW ALGEO
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