The Foreign Service Journal, November 2021

62 NOVEMBER 2021 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL A Fool and a Whore John Peter Fer, independently published, 2021, $15/paperback, 368 pages. The action in this novel unfolds over most of a decade: from Desert Shield (2003) through most of President Barack Obama’s first term (2011). Stuck somewhere between boomers and millennials, Trey Ciuri—a Gener- ation-Whatever—tries to kill himself four times in various ways. Readers experience each suicide attempt from Trey’s perspective, and then witness his recovery via conversations with best friends. As the author observes, most people don’t get such second and third chances. Fer notes in his afterword that he wrote the story about a decade after its fictional setting, between the deaths of Freddie Gray (2015) and George Floyd (2020). When Gray was killed, the author was living in Baltimore and commuting to Foggy Bottom; his wife taught at a public high school not far from the CVS that burned in the subsequent riots. Five years later, Fer was working in Embassy Riga when Floyd was killed. As a public diplomacy officer, he notes, it was tough to witness such traumatic events, and even harder to explain them to foreign audiences. But in the final analysis, this book is primarily targeted to American readers—particularly those of us who, as Fer puts it, “have little or no skin in the game.” John Peter Fer is currently the information officer for Embassy Tbilisi. Since joining the State Department Foreign Service in 2009 as a public diplomacy officer, he has served in New Delhi, Managua, Moscow, Riga and Washington, D.C. An Air Force veteran and returned Peace Corps volunteer, he worked as a firefighter/EMT prior to joining the Foreign Service. Sheriff B.J. Kincaid: Honky Tonk Man: A Western Adventure Charles Ray, independently published, 2021, $5.99/paperback, e-book available, 76 pages. The latest in a series of Western novellas for young people, Sheriff B.J. Kincaid: Honky Tonk Man features an unforgettable protagonist: Bobbie Jo Kincaid, a classic tomboy who wants to be known simply as B.J. Despite her parents’ opposition, B.J. sticks to her guns (literally and figuratively) and eventu- ally convinces the mayor of Calabash Crossing to hire her to replace the sheriff who was gunned down, by promising him that she would find the old sheriff’s killer. Even after fulfilling that pledge in the first volume, Sheriff Kincaid wages a never-ending struggle to get the men of the town to take her seriously as a woman and respect her legal authority. Fortunately, over the course of the series she makes valuable allies, such as Mazie Carter, a former showgirl who ends up owning a saloon; bounty hunter Jacob Blade (who may just be more than a friend to B.J.); and her two deputies. Five other volumes in the series were also published in 2020 and 2021. They are: Draw Fast …Or Die!, Cry of the Raven, Gunsmoke and Glory, Gunfight at the Silver Dollar Saloon and Thirteen Steps to the Gallows: A Western Adventure . Though each of these novellas is concise, Charles Ray packs a whole lot of action, intrigue, romance and humor into every book. Each one will leave you hungry for more! A prolific writer with nearly 200 titles to his name, and a regular contributor to The Foreign Service Journal , Charles Ray is a retired FSO and former ambassador to Cambodia and Zimbabwe. Before beginning his Foreign Service career, Ambassador Ray was in the U.S. Army for 20 years, retiring in 1982 as a major. This year, in addition to this series, he has completed another series and begun a new one. They are described below. Caleb Johnson: Mountain Man: Showdown at Shiloh: A Frontier Western Adventure Charles Ray, independently published, 2021, $6.99/paperback, e-book available, 74 pages. Showdown at Shiloh is the twelfth and latest volume in author Charles Ray’s frontier adventure series featur- ing the life of Caleb Johnson, a Black mountain man who saves former Confederate officer Ben Winthrop from a lynch mob and then guides him from Colorado to Oregon. Caleb then lets himself be talked into spending two years there, helping Ben get his ranch started, before saddling his horse (named Horse), and returning to Bear Creek, Colorado, with his dog (Dog). There Caleb and his Shoshone wife, Flora, add a third member to the menagerie: Snuffy, a bear cub whose mother