Our Grandmothers' Drums: A Portrait of Rural African Life and Culture

Mark Hudson. Henry Holt & Company, $13.95 (0pp) ISBN 978-0-8050-1620-8

Hudson, a young Englishman, spent 14 months in a village in Gambia. He originally intended only to observe the community, but as time passed, he became an active participant in the rituals of a people who inhabit termite-infested huts, live near dangerous bush and are entirely reliant on an annual rainy season for survival. PW called this a ``perceptive first book.'' (May)

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