Amazon Vernelle Edwards Category:  Romance Publisher: Gi Chi Publishing/Dog Ear Publishing ISBN-10:  1598581198 Type: Fiction Pages: 167 Copyright: December 19, 2005 "Missionary" follows the adventures of a college student who falls in love and travels to Accra, Ghana. She finds herself in the middle of a military coup. Chapter One THE MAN OF THE HOUSE Mama and Daddy knew the University of Ghana accepted me as an exchange student, but they did not know about Emmanuel Edrah. After I assured them I would be living in the Old Ashley mission in Accra and would spend all of my free time doing God's work, they embraced me. Daddy reverently raised his eyes to heaven and thanked God for giving them such an obedient, good girl who accepted the highest calling in life; to be a missionary. "My daughter will be serving the less fortunate and spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ," Daddy proudly exclaimed. My conscience kicked so hard I silently prayed:"Lordie, please don't let me bust hell wide open for keeping secrets from my parents."   Excerpt "Water is sweeter. Sugar is wetter. Everything's better, when you're in love."

Dr. Dulaney reviews
Ms. Edwards has written a very fascinating and interesting book. She sets her story in two of the most significant places in the African and African American experience: Charleston, South Carolina and Ghana, West Africa. These are two places with which Africans and Americans of African descent have many ancestral and emotional ties because of their connections to the slave trade. Gullah-geechee culture, Pan-Africanism, and African independence movements.

The novel focused primarily on the love relationship that developed between a native of Charleston and a Ghanaian attending the College of Charleston. The setting of the novel alternates back and forh from Charleston to Accra, Ghana.

The romance is paralleled by the rise of the regime of Flight Lieutentant Jerry Rawlings as Ghana's ruler after a coup in 1979. This seemingly insider's view of the 1979 coup makes the book more than just a tale of obsessive love and eventual marriage.