Words Matter Journalism Anthology Out Now!

I'm very happy and proud to have one of my articles from Iraq, "Video Games with a Refugee" included in the University of Missouri press anthology, Words Matter: Writing to Make A Difference. My contribution is about playing with a young Syrian refugee I met in Najaf while writing a series on Iraq. This piece won the 2013 Society of American Travel Writers Award. Here's the blurb for the book:

Newspapers and magazines have been steadily shrinking, and more and more former subscribers have gone to digital and internet sources for the news. Yet it has become increasingly clear that “short takes” don’t satisfy many readers, who still long for nuanced, long form journalism. By providing examples of classic magazine articles by professional writers, all of whom are graduates of the Missouri School of Journalism, this book fulfills the need for more sophisticated, thought-provoking essays that will resonate with both the general reader and students.

The book is divided into three broad categories: profiles, first person journalism, and personal memoirs, and includes the original articles as well as a “postscript” by the writers in which they discuss what they’ve learned about writing, journalism, and the business of getting published. Useful for students and instructors in writing programs, the book also appeals to writers interested in both the art and the craft of successful writing.

By the way, you can still read my piece on the now.defunct but still online travel blog Gadling. The article is here.

Travel Tuesday: Street Food in Iraq

Mazgouf, a fish native to the Tigris River, being cooked by an open fire at Abu Nuwas Park, Baghdad. This is a local specialty. The fish is cut in half and cooked. The remaining skin acts as a bowl as you scoop out the gooey innards.

There's been a lot of grim news coming out of Iraq for a long time now. Usually when we see Iraq on TV we see some psycho fundamentalist or something that's just blown up. So it's important to remember that real people still live there and are trying to make the most out of a bad situation.

Back in 2012 I traveled to Iraq and wrote a series about it for the now moribund travel blog Gadling. It was one of the best and most intense trips of my life. Click the link to read the series. Sadly, the photo galleries have been taken offline, but you can still read the articles.

So here, for your culinary enjoyment, are some photos of the food, mostly street food, I ate while I was there. There are more after the jump. Bon appetit!

Mazgouf ready to be eaten.

Travel Tuesday: Exploring Ancient Hatra

This charming sculpture of a nursing baby camel probably doesn't exist anymore. It's from Hatra, an ancient city in Iraq that's probably the oldest city founded by Arabs, dating to the 3rd century BC. Unfortunately, it's in the area controlled by ISIS and they recently trashed this ancient site. I write more about it over at Black Gate in the article, Ancient Hatra: Another Victim of ISIS. Like with the Assyrian sites of Nimrud and Nineveh, these are archaeological wonders I was lucky enough to see when I was in Iraq back in 2012, before the nightmare of ISIS was unleashed on the world.

Travel Tuesday: Visiting Nimrud before it was Destroyed

As regular readers of this blog know, I visited Iraq in 2012. One of the places I got to see was Nimrud, an ancient Assyrian capital. I wrote about it recently for Black Gate in the article Memories of Mosul before ISIS.

Actually, I was writing an obituary. ISIS has recently trashed Nimrud and another important Assyrian site called Nineveh. They destroyed all the statues, including this winged bull at the Nimrud palace gate. They also continued their practice of digging up artifact to sell on the international black market. They only destroy the big showy stuff for the cameras, the rest they sell so they can buy weapons. I'll be writing a post for Black Gate about Hatra tomorrow, another ancient site they destroyed.

Blogging about travel and history in Iraq

Alongside my Iraq travel series for Gadling, I've been doing a bunch of guest posts for other blogs about my trip.

For Osprey Publishing I wrote about the Baghdad North Gate War Cemetery, where many of the British Empire's fallen from the First World War are interred. For A.J. Walker's blog on medieval history and archaeology, I wrote a guest post about a medieval castle in Iraq. Over at The Adventure Blog I've written about the ancient Arab city of Hatra. I also wrote about Exploring Medieval Baghdad for Black Gate Magazine, which published my historical fantasy novella The Quintessence of Absence.

So head on over to these sites and get some good free reading, otherwise this Iraqi kid will ride his ancient lion over to your house and eat you!

New travel series on Iraq

Yes, I haven't posted on this blog for a while, but there's a new crop of book reviews coming up so it will get a bit more lively here. Right now I'm busy on my latest series for Gadling, which is about traveling in Iraq. I spent 17 days in the country last month and I'm writing a long series about my intense yet mostly positive experiences there. It's called Destination: Iraq. Check it out!