Brought up in Africa, a young American woman comes back for nine months in 1982-83 as a writer-photographer in the interior of Ghana, and in this attractively written book recounts her experiences working for a "national linguistic group" that is spreading literacy and translating the Bible into native languages. Among the five sectionsAdvent, Epiphany, Lent, Passover and Pentecostare descriptions of a lively dinner with five young men; the relationship of Mary, an ascetic Irish translator-editor, with the remote villagers among whom she resides; and a terrifying incident in which an angry, white-hating military officer arrests two helpless women because their newly bought vehicle does not yet have a license plate. The sweetness of life and strength of death are among the many memorable images associated with Belcher's coming-of-age.