Letters From the Land of Fear

by Calvin White

For 11 months Calvin White worked for Doctors Without Borders as a mental health specialist in the off-the-radar region of Karakalpakstan in western Uzbekistan. Unlike the higher profile emergency situations which draw that international humanitarian organization's attention, the milieu for White's mission was the quiet, slow death in an epidemic of multi-drug resistant tuberculosis. As White's forward says: "This is a small story about small people written by a small person so maybe there is no interest in it. On the other hand, since most of us on the planet are also small, maybe there is." White takes the reader inside the daily heartbeat of humans we've never heard of but come to see as sharing the same pulse. It is a remarkable journey of intimacy and hope, one that reconfigures our understanding of sadness and, ultimately, reaffirms the common spirit of humanity.

400 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 2015

Reviews

[Melissa Lindsey · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's about the people of Central Asia. And TB. What's not to love? It's like this book was written just for me, to heal my heart after what I often consider my forced leaving of a land I loved. Calvin White gets this country right. His descriptions of the people are spot on -- the civility, the ability to endure hardships, the easy smiles, the stern looks, and the most beautiful eyes ever seen. His descriptions of TB spare the reader nothing and we get a long, hard look into a disease that has been essential extinct in the West.

That said, I am not sure how this book will translate for other readers who don't have the familiarity with Central Asia. As White rightly points out, the names are unfamiliar. He does us a great favor by including a chapter with all the girl's names that include "Gul" in them, which helps, but even though every single name was familiar to me, I felt confused at times who he was talking about, simply because there were so many people he interacted with. Add in difficulties with the foreign names, and I could easily see some of my students abandoning the book in confusion.

Also, this is written like a diary. This means that there are random asides that don't get fully developed, fragments of memories, and other ruminations that were interesting to me, but may not be to other readers. I wanted to know how White was experiencing Uzbekistan, but not all readers will enjoy his writing style.

I don't necessarily agree with everything he did, but who doesn't go into an unfamiliar culture and make some mistakes? I am certain that what I perceive to be his mistakes were borne out of deep compassion and even love for the people he was caring for. And it may have been his love for the people he was with that endured me most to this book.

I would recommend this book to readers who really want to know more about the people of Central Asia (including Kazakhstan and Kirghistan). In the middle of some very serious suffering, he gets the people right.

[Melissa · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a fascinating look into the life of a doctor working in Uzbekistan. It reads like a journal with entries of various lengths. I think this would be an excellent book for someone who is interested in working in a developing region. It gives a lot of interesting (and sometimes random) details about life for an expat. However, as a literary work this book is lacking. The story is a bit choppy and it's hard to keep track of all of the characters. There are a lot of sentence fragments that would be understandable in someone's personal journal, but could have been cleaned up before publishing. Plus it's a lot to read about TB if you aren't extremely interested in TB.