Book Launch: Cold Coffee in Asmara

By John Coster

The last 12 months have seen many developments at the Documentary Media Centre that hosts the Parallel Lives Network.

We’ve started a Series of heritage events called Saturday Heritage Fairs and we’ve integrated the Parallel Lives Network into them by hosting international-focused heritage projects based locally in Leicester. This has seen our strands of ‘Artists as Collectors‘ and ‘Authors as Documentarians‘ beginning to take shape and broaden the reach of the events.

Andy Goss has already had his first novel, The Humanitarian, which is set during the immediate aftermath of the Pakistan earthquake, archived in our Parallel Lives Archive’s Pakistan section. I’m delighted to be supporting Andy with his first event for the second novel, Cold Coffee in Asmara set in Eritrea.

I’ll post some images from the Book Launch on Tuesday 26th March at the Orso Coffee Shop, Market Place, Leicester.

Overview: From the Book Guild website…

When traumatised aid worker John Cousins arrives in north-east Africa he hopes to find a sense of personal peace among a gentle people rebuilding their lives following a bitter and prolonged war. In Eritrea he begins to forget his own emotional pain and lay to rest the ghosts of his previous mission in Pakistan. Will the work with fellow aid worker and nurse Hannah Johnson help heal the scars? And what is the secret of her own past?

Cold Coffee in Asmara is a story of personal loss, redemption and love set against a backdrop of humanitarian work in a remote corner of the world where African, Arab and European influences collide.

Andrew Goss is a former print journalist, overseas aid worker and humanitarian reporter. His work has led him to travel across Europe, Africa and South Asia. His new novel, Cold Coffee in Asmara, is set in Eritrea, north-east Africa, following its protracted war with Ethiopia and is the second in a planned trilogy focusing on some of the world’s poorest communities. He lives in Leicester with his partner Claire, a nurse and former aid worker.

You can buy the book £9.99 by clicking here