Love in the Driest Season: A Family Memoir
by Neely Tucker
Bantam $200
Neely Tucker was a foreign correspondent for The Washington Post. Born in rural Mississippi, he rebelled young. He read Papillon and Treasure Island and stared at train tracks, dreaming of escape. His investigation of a murder-suicide for the local newspaper was so thorough that the sheriff tipped back his hat and asked: 'Son, what kinda flesh-eating ghoul are ya tryin' to be?'
Not a bad question, and comfortable with much of Tucker's life. In seven years, he dodged death in more than 50 countries. He was a war junkie, hooked on the adrenaline of conflict.
Oxygen came in female form. Vita - black, dreadlocked, widowed, 11 years his senior - was a paralegal and his neighbour. 'In Michigan's bitterly cold winters, we rented movies on Sunday afternoons and hooted at the screen, throwing popcorn at bad dialogue.' In Sarajevo, Tucker ran to the US press office during a lull in the shelling to call her on the satellite phone: 'Name the most romantic place you can think of.' His family boycotted their wedding; hers regarded it as little more than a kinky fling. Their only sadness? They could have no children.