Hard Corp

By Margaret Hicks in Arts & Entertainment on Apr 25, 2006 6:06PM

We’ve traveled a bit, we’ve been to Singapore, Indonesia and Thailand. We’ve acquired faint ideas of what living in a third world country must be like, but we still had cute REI backpacks and pretty, pink mosquito nets.

So, we don’t fully understand what it’s like to be a part of a culture that is completely different from ours. That’s why we’ve put Tony D’Souza’s first novel “Whiteman” on our to-read list, right before “Getting Things Done” (are we the only ones who haven’t read this book yet?), and right after “Possession” which we’ve started and put down a million times.

“Whiteman” is a story of a relief worker in West Africa, who refuses to leave his village even after the threat of war looms between Muslims and Christians. D’Souza, born and raised in Chicago, was himself a Peace Corp volunteer for three years in the same West African area he writes about in his novel. Now, according to the New York Times book review, the book sounds great and educational and beautiful and all that, but what really rolls our wagon, is that Nerve Magazine nominated the novel as having the best sex scene. Rock. On. That’s almost better than the Pulitzer Prize we were coveting a few weeks ago.

You can see Tony D’Souza, presented by the Chicago Humanities Festival, at 6:15 PM, Wednesday, April 26th, at Alliance Francaise de Chicago, 54 W. Chicago, event is free, but reservations required. 312.494.9509