Everything Lost Is Found Again: Four Seasons in Lesotho

by Will McGrath

Funny and heartfelt, this amalgamation of memoir and essay collection tells the story of twenty months the author spent in Lesotho, the small, landlocked kingdom surrounded by South Africa. There he finds a spirit of joyful absurdity and resolve, surrounded by people who take strangers’ hands as they walk down the road, people who―with sweetest face―drop the dirtiest jokes in the southern hemisphere. But Lesotho is also a place where shepherds exact Old Testament retribution, where wounded pride incites murder and families are devastated by the AIDS epidemic.

Driven by a spirit of openhearted cultural exchange in the style of Bill Bryson’s In a Sunburned Country and Alexandra Fuller’s Cocktail Hour Under the Tree of Forgetfulness, Will McGrath’s Everything Lost Is Found Again is a love-drunk ballad to Lesotho, infusing humor and heart into pop ethnography.

Genres: Nonfiction, Africa, Travel, Memoir, Lesotho, Biography, Book Club

224 pages, Paperback

Published November 13, 2018

Reviews

[Jenny (Reading Envy) · Rating 4 out of 5]

When I look for books set in other countries, I always try to find ownvoices reads first. In a rare case I will read a memoir of an outsider's experience in the country, like I have done in this case.

Will McGrath spends his initial year in Lesotho (pronounced Leh-soo-too) because his wife is a cultural anthropologist focused on AIDs and resulting orphans. Lesotho's adult population is 25% HIV positive, with a lot of grandparents caring for grandchildren, so it was the right place for her to go. Will worked at a school.

Unlike some outsider writings where they seem to mock people living in a place (J. Maarten Troost comes to mind,) Will is curious about language nuances and how people think, without taking any of it too seriously. Both he and Ellen build relationships with people and seem good at going with the flow. I wish he knew that granadilla was passion fruit though. That's going to bug me forever.

I learned a lot about the country landlocked by South Africa, while also being entirely different from South Africa. This will count for the Read the World 21 challenge for this month, focusing on South and East Africa, and crosses another country off my world list.

[Tom · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is as much a review of Will McGrath as it is of his stellar book. You know how some people just get it, and it almost gets on your nerves? McGrath gets it, and it bugs me in the best way. If we were to examine this book purely on the level of the sentence, we’d be overwhelmed, already. This author is painfully articulate. Effortlessly literate. He is sometimes showy with his language, but the reader never begrudges him that; it always works; it’s always charming. He just gets it. But there is so much more to praise. The most important is this: this book has, at its center, a beautiful heart. McGrath cares for the people he’s writing about and he shows it on every page. This author foresaw and avoided every potential pitfall of that bizarre genre wherein a white man travels abroad and has some transformative personal experience while completely ignoring the humanity of the people around him. His love for Lesotho and its people is consistently palpable and inspiring. He never gets in the way of the people and the stories he is telling. Instead he bears witness. It sounds overblown but it is assuredly not. Will McGrath just gets it. This book is funny and honest, straightforward and poetic, tender and rigorous. I’m already excited for the next one.

[Taylor Colony · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Kena ka khotso? That is the motto for this place. It means: Enter with peace. If you want to know about this place, then come peacefully and with eyes open. That is all you need here."

This is such a sweet and real lil glimpse into life in Lesotho and I need everyone to read it and understand how special this place is

[Eliz L · Rating 5 out of 5]

I laughed out loud, I cried a little. This memoir is well-organized/edited, magnificently avoids self-indulgence, and remains warm, truthful, and funny throughout.

[Joanne Clarke Gunter · Rating 5 out of 5]

A delightful and informative book written by a gifted writer. Will McGrath and his wife Ellen lived and worked in Lesotho (pronounced Leh-SOO-too) for almost two years, Will working as a teacher and Ellen as a cultural anthropologist specializing in the study of AIDS and orphan care. Lesotho is a small and beautiful mountainous country surrounded entirely by South Africa and has one of the highest rates of HIV/AIDS in the world. But even with so much sorrow and poverty, the people are joyful, hard-working, and resilient. And funny. The people Will meets and works with love a funny story and any opportunity to have a celebration. The stories of the people of Lesotho drive this book. Some of the stories are sad and heart-wrenching, but just as often they are hilarious or touching.

I have read a number of books about various African countries, but I haven't read a book about Lesotho before this one and because of Will McGrath's exceptional, descriptive, and often very funny writing, this book was a very good read. He paints a beautiful and lively picture of the country and its people with his words. Highly recommended reading.

[Sasha Rivers · Rating 5 out of 5]

the peace corps sucks lol (this is an inference from my own life, not something one would inherently understand from the book)

made me appreciate this silly little country even that much more. I won't be here forever! what a simultaneously comforting and disquieting thought. you should read this even if you don't live here.

[Becky Dale · Rating 4 out of 5]

Absolutely delightful start to finish. Will has captured so much of the Lesotho that I know and love. It is true that I probably appreciated this book more for having lived in these same rondavels, met these same characters and travelled these same roads, but I believe that the beauty of the storytelling would shine through even for the uninitiated. Off to test this theory now by giving away copies to friends and family!

[Brian · Rating 4 out of 5]

(4.0) Entertaining cultural dispatches from Lesotho

He and his wife really embedded while they were there, or at least as well as a white couple could. Funny (often self-deprecatingly so) stories, heart-tugging stories, told with respect and admiration for the Basotho. Only criticism is that he jumps around a lot, sometimes to effect, but often short-attention-span-like, preventing deeper immersion into the people, culture or particular anecdote. You feel a bit as if you’re flying over the country rather than inhabiting it.

[Dylan · Rating 5 out of 5]

A gem. A beautiful and sympathetic work about a place few of us know but more of us should. Enter Will McGrath. His writing manages, with remarkable skill, to balance humor, tragedy, poetic prose, and exposition in such a way that none eclipses the other and all are given just the weight they deserve.

I recommend this to anybody interested in anything.

[Dooug · Rating 5 out of 5]

Honest, heartfelt, and humbly humorous. Recommend!

[Cynthia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful writing--sometimes raw, sometimes humorous, always insightful and sensitive. Made me feel like I've been there.

[Krutika · Rating 5 out of 5]

Everything lost is found again.
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I cannot thank @dzancbooks enough for sending this book :)
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I have always enjoyed reading memoirs, partly because it gives us more than a peek inside the lives of writers but mostly because of the honesty that exudes from it. Everything lost is found again is a marvelous book written with so much tenderness that it teared me up and also made me laugh at more than one instance. If you've been following me for a while, you must know how dear African literature is to me and this book being set in Lesotho, I had no doubt that I'd come to love it.
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Will McGrath recounts his experience of living in Lesotho, a small landlocked kingdom in South Africa in this witty book. The narration is so detailed that it ranges from how to speak the language, to even addressing the difference between how the people of America and Lesotho treat the topic of breasts. When Will and his wife Ellen move to Lesotho for 20 months to work for an NGO that treats AIDS and HIV patients, he experiences the cultural shift almost immediately. He keeps the readers entertained by even choosing banal topics like food and music and turns into something hilarious.
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Even though this book has it's witty moments, Will does not fail to show the seriousness that tags along with poverty and diseases that local Lesotho people are proned to. Yet they are content with what they have and don't complain. This is without a doubt, a very beautiful book and also quite painful to see the sufferings of children battling AIDS and HIV. Having said that, it's a literary delight to witness the ease with which the author has penned down this book. It's funny, serious, witty and emotional, all rolled into one.
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Rating - 5/5.

[Matthew Seckinger · Rating 5 out of 5]

Heartfelt and humorous. Sensitive and insightful. I hesitate to fall back on cliche, but this book made me laugh and cry, sometimes within a matter of only a page or two.

I feel as though I visited Lesotho with Ellen and Will, met the people he met.

This book reminded me, and I mean this as a compliment, of Dave Eggers and early 20th Century Russian novelists.

Well done, Will. Thank you for the read!

[Drew Whitley · Rating 4 out of 5]

It was tender and he has a lot of interesting stories. It was cool that as small as this country is, I couldn’t relate to all of his experiences. Crazy to see how much worse the HIV issue was only 15 years ago. Didn’t love the romanticized description of famo.

[Kristin Boldon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Some of the cover blurbs of this book emphasize how funny this book is. And it is. But it's so much more that it does a disservice to the book and its potential readers. McGrath is a goofy observer of often tragic things. And he plays a supporting role in the book to both his wife, Ellen, the anthropologist whose work with AIDS took them to Lesotho in the first place, and Nthabeleng, who runs the safe home for orphans there. This is a beautiful book that covers the whole range of human experience, which includes, but is not limited to, the funny and charming stuff. McGrath shines his sharp yet kind consideration on it all.

[Thomas · Rating 5 out of 5]

Will McGrath's superb travel memoir about his family's time in Lesotho is fully transporting, both wise and witty and well worth a read!

[Steve Stelzner · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was a joy to read. I was entertained and educated.

[Bookjamin Stivers · Rating 5 out of 5]

Will doesn't hit you over the head with anything. He lets you feel the story beautifully by highlighting a few interactions, some tangentially related but at the end of the chapter they have all come together to make me feel for this country and these people. I get goosebumps, or a sly smile from a cute chapter, or inspired, or watery eyes and crushing existentialism. This is a beautiful book.

[Jen Cameron · Rating 5 out of 5]

“I can say one thing with certainty: I did not come to Lesotho to find myself. There is nothing more tedious than white people venturing into foreign territory in search of self-knowledge, in search of authenticity—which must be among the language’s emptiest words. There is something deeply unsettling about people who collect the essential stuff of someone else’s existence for exotic furniture in their own small-scale dramas. I did not come to Lesotho for set dressing; I came to learn about the different ways that people live.”

One of the things I love most about this book is that McGrath doesn’t try to package anything up into a moral lesson. Nothing annoys me more than a memoir where the author tries to write a tidy wrap-up essay on “what I learned about: myself, the world, other people...”

This book is a series of essays constructed loosely into seasons of the year+ he and his cultural anthropologist wife Ellen spent in Lesotho. Ellen’s particular field of study is AIDS and orphan care, and Lesotho has the highest percentage of both. It is clear from the outset that McGrath has a sincere desire to learn about Lesotho, its people and culture.

While in Lesotho, he works as a high school teacher and also at the safe house for orphans, many of which are also infected with HIV. His humor is self deprecating, but the goal isn’t just to get laughs. He shares his experience and wonder in this charming book, and adds so much richness and depth to a country that many people have never heard of, and which he says in his initial searches for information basically describe it as landlocked and impoverished. In conversations with fellow Americans who travel to other countries, we are generally a group of people who are stuck in their ways, expecting the world to bend our whims and desire. But McGrath embraces this entirely new world and culture and seems to delight in it wanting to get to experience as much as possible, while also navigating the heartbreaking reality and devastation AIDS has wrought on its population.

[Lamadia · Rating 4 out of 5]

It was remarkably difficult to find books about Lesotho to read before a trip there, but this one came up on a search, and I'm glad it did. The author lived in Lesotho, in the town of Mokhotlong, for a year when his wife was working there. The author got a position teaching in the high school for that time. Due to the nature of his wife's research regarding the orphans of AIDS, at a facility for those orphans, many of the stories are very sad, but he always seems to find a poignant and moving message in it. He is also often very funny. He seems to be one who can always find the amusing side of things, and it makes for a good read.

[Raksha Vasudevan · Rating 4 out of 5]

A funny, tender essay collection about the little-known country of Lesotho: its people and ways of living, its absorbing landscapes and history. I'm usually skeptical of white Americans writing about Africa, but McGrath portrays Lesotho and the people he comes to know there with great care. His friends, students and neighbors are fascinating and well-rounded, and his days as a teacher are both mundane and thrilling. In the four seasons McGrath spends in Lesotho, we encounter the AIDS epidemic, home brew, bus transport, the local languages, shepherds, midnight dance parties and more in fast-paced, finely crafted language. At turns emotional and hilarious, the only thing missing from this book for me was more of Mcgrath's reactions and emotions to the things and people he encountered. After reading this, I felt I knew Lesotho but not McGrath himself. Hopefully in his next book!

[Gabrielle · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this all in one day, two sittings. Really engaging writing - loved the descriptive style, though the English word choice was occasionally a bit complicated, so I have some nice new words for my vocabulary. Thought he was conscientious of not just creating another “here’s Africa, from the POV of a white person” book, with heartfelt personal stories and stories of heartbreak as well as joy and daily life. One side effect: a good reminder that some of the days best spent are not about progressing, but experiencing.

[Anna · Rating 3 out of 5]

A solid good book. A nice surprise, as I commented in a status update apparently, instead of a review: I don’t typically enjoy essay collections or short stories. There’s an exception for every rule, yes?

[Jessica Pinkley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great interpretation of how to write from an honest perspective from an unfamiliar culture.

[Rhea Tregebov · Rating 5 out of 5]

A delightful, wise and brilliant book. I learned so much from reading it.

[Katrina Arndt · Rating 4 out of 5]

As one reviewer noted, Will McGrath waxes poetic but it's not pretentious. He writes beautifully about his experience as a white man in Lesotho, trailing his wife who is working as an anthropologist. He doesn't veer into navel-gazing transformative narrative - but sometimes he does - and it works. I look forward to reading more from him.

[Lauren J. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely well written and a great story. Must read!

[Liz · Rating 5 out of 5]

A wonderful, moving and funny series of essays and memoirs of the author's time in Lesotho with his wife Ellen. She is an anthropologist and McGrath is a teacher in a local school. They live in a native style home and actively participate in the local culture, food, and drink. Many children where they live have been orphaned by HIV-AIDS and many of them have contracted the dreaded disease. Alternately riotously funny, sad and very interesting. A lovely read.

[Jenny · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book from the opening scene in which McGrath is lost in a minivan with children's songs playing on repeat from the tape deck. This book is organized by season, but there's so much creativity in each chapter: brief vignettes, woven stories, "A Brief Primer on [ ----]", dictionaries on food and drink. I feel like I learned so much about a place I knew very little about before, and he teaches readers in a way that is graced with humanity and affection.

Through McGrath's portrayal of characters, I felt like I got to know them - I cried when children passed away and laughed when fellow teachers made sexual innuendos. This book put me on a spectrum on emotions, and the occasional one-liners like, "...similar to the low-cc dirt bikes that she [his wife, Ellen], in her Canadian childhood, was raised on, since she was raised by wolves" that had me laughing out loud.

Thank you, Mr. Will McGrath, for this collection of love letters to a place that captured your heart. It was an inspiring read.

[Nell K Ryan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved every bit of this book

Wills stories the beauty and tragedy of Lesotho are woven together with a humble humor. I was laughing and crying - love this book so much!