Around the World ~ Argentina, Tanzania, Germany

Out of the Silence: After the Crash ~ by Eduardo Strauch, translated by Jennie Erikson, 2012 (translation 2019), memoir (Argentina)

The extraordinary story of the rugby team who crashed in the Andes mountains in 1972.  One of the survivors breaks his silence to tell a personal story of survival, hope, and spiritual awakening in the face of unspeakable tragedy.  The unfathomable modern legend of the 1972 Andes plane crash and the Uruguayan rugby teammates who suffered seventy-two days among the dead and dying which has become a testament to the resilience of the human spirit.  The harrowing test of endurance on a snowbound cordillera ended in a miraculous rescue.

Four decades after the tragedy, a climber discovered survivor Eduardo Strauch’s wallet near the memorialized crash site and returned it to him.  It was a gesture that compelled Strauch to finally "break the silence of the mountains."  He withholds nothing as he reveals the truth behind the life-changing events that challenged him physically and tested him spiritually, but would never destroy him.  In revisiting the horror story we thought we knew, Strauch shares how surviving on the mountain, in the face of its fierce, unforgiving power and desolate beauty, forever altered his perception of love, friendship, death, fear, loss, and hope.

Hard Rain ~ by Irma Venter, translated by Elsa Silke, 2012 (translation 2020), fiction (Tanzania)

Journalist Alex Derksen’s new assignment in Tanzania should be easy, but he soon finds himself on the wrong side of the news.  It starts when he meets Ranna, a beautiful photographer with something to hide.  Alex stopped believing in love a long time ago, yet here in the middle of East Africa, it’s found him again.  Alex knows a thing or two about chaos — wherever he goes, it follows.  When an IT billionaire washes up onshore after seasonal flooding, he finds himself at the center of an investigation with Ranna as the main suspect.  It turns out she may have a good reason for hiding her past.  Wherever she goes, murder follows.  Alex should be used to these cat-and-mouse games, but this time it’s different.  Should he listen to his heart and help Ranna hide the bloody trail leading to her?  Or should he use his head and run for his life?

Your Perfect Year ~ by Charlotte Lucas, translated by Alison Layl, 2016 (translation 2019), fiction (Germany)

A man consumed by a meaningless life is going to do something he’s never considered doing before.  He’s going to enjoy the day.  For hyper-particular publishing heir Jonathan Grief, the day starts like any other — with a strict morning fitness regimen that’ll keep his divorced, easily irritated, cynical, forty-two-year-old self in absolutely flawless physical condition.  But all it takes to put a crimp in his routine is one small annoyance. Someone has left a leather-bound day planner with the handwritten title "Your Perfect Year" in his spot on his mountain bike at his fitness course!

Determined to discover its owner, Jonathan opens the calendar to find that someone known only as “H.” has filled it in with suggestions, tasks, and affirmative actions for each day.  The more he devotes himself to locating the elusive H., the deeper Jonathan is drawn into someone else’s rich and generous narrative — and into an attitude adjustment he desperately needs.  He may have ended up with a perfect year by accident, but it seems fate has set Jonathan on a path toward healing, feeling, and maybe even loving again — if only he can meet the stranger who’s changing his life one day at a time.

These three books are among nine Read the World 2020 books offered free for Kindle through April 24 for World Book Day.