Half a Piece of Cloth: The Courage of Africa's Countless Widows

From dirt-floor huts to refugee camps to halls of power, Jane L. Crane traveled across Africa to see if the plight of widows was as dire as she'd heard. Is one-in-four women in Africa, from young to old, really a widow? In an easy-to-read style, this fascinating book tells the stories of nearly 60 widows, and Crane's story as she finds them.

She met with widows who survived the genocide in Rwanda, ran from the Lord's Resistance Army in Uganda, survived the "rape capital of the world" in the DR Congo, fought for their land in Zambia, and live with HIV/AIDS in a black township in South Africa. She also met with tribal, religious, and government leaders to get their take on the widows' plight.