In 2014 Western efforts at engaging the Middle East—diplomacy, occupation, sanctions, bribery, adjusted trade policy, ill-considered cultural engagement and, worst of all, war, collapsed in the ruins of Syria and Iraq.

Ignorance of the locale’s complex braid of culture, peoples, language, and faith among leaders and populations in the English-speaking world compounded the failed attempts at influence.

Brutal death-cults fill the vacuum left by these bankrupt Imperial efforts. Leaving death, desperation, and trails of blood in their wake, they stalk villages and byways under the conceit of establishing a “new Caliphate.”

Just in time, intrepid traveler, teacher, scholar, and journalist Francesca Recchia brings hope for enlightenment, nuanced discussion, and moral clarity with her stunning new memoir, Picnic in a Minefield.

The book details her experiences living, working, and traveling among the Kurds of northern Iraq. This timely book offers a first-hand account of life, living, and lives-lived in area of the globe that perpetually dominates the West’s concerns and discourse.

Recchia’s unique style and points-of-view illuminate Kurdish culture and the place of Kurds, who have long yearned for self-determination, amidst a cohort of nations intent on denying the mountainous Kurdish homeland its sovereignty. Recchia recounts how living in the region affected more than her understanding of, and opinions on, Kurdish culture.

Through crisp prose and unforgettable anecdote, she shares with us the gift she received in Kurdistan: the company of the Kurdish people, liberated from an abstract prison of newsprint, brought to life in the minds and hearts of readers.

Picnic in a Minefield, by Francesca Recchia, is published by Foxhead Books. The book is on sale now at bookstores, online retailers, and foxheadbooks.com.