Madeen is a Senior Associate Professor of Modern Literature at Tokyo City University and Lecturer at Keio University. He writes cross-genre but terms himself as unclassifiable and has penned a number of Amazon bestsellers.
Eric Madeen's bestselling work of literary fiction, 'Water Drumming In The Soul: A Novel of Racy Love in the Heart of Africa,’ will be available at no charge in ebook form August 31 through September 2, 2026 at Amazon at https://www.amazon.com/stores/Eric-Madeen/author/B08VGRNJVW.
'Water Drumming In The Soul' is a transformative journey inspired by Madeen's adventures in Africa.
In this fiery tale set in steamy equatorial Africa, Peace Corps volunteer David Fields is on mission: to build a medical dispensary in a village where spells are cast on enemies and fear of a witch doctor reigns. David seldom has his bearings – cultural or geographical – and must fight a cocktail of tropical maladies as well as social taboos as he throws himself into work. Until he meets Assam. Captivated by her water drumming, her playing the stream as a drum, David is drawn to her early on and becomes the hunter captured by the game. And what a rollicking game of love it is - with a tension or excitement between them that never dissipates, until the haunting end.
In the same manner as bestselling travel author Paul Theroux, Eric Madeen has never stopped seeing himself as a Peace Corps volunteer. Just after graduating from the University of Arizona, he helped to build a primary school complex in Francophone Gabon, Africa. In an equatorial village ringed by rainforest, his journey turned unexpectedly personal: he went hunting for monkeys to fill the cooking pot, got lost for three days, and came home with more than a story. It was there, in that wild landscape, that he fell in love—and the experience would later be transformed into fiction, giving his first novel, Water Drumming in the Soul, a vivid, lived-in reality.
Readers and reviewers have expressed high praise for 'Water Drumming In The Soul.' One Amazon reviewer said, "Water Drumming in the Soul” not only tells a passionate love story, but it also delves into thought-provoking themes like culture, identity, and the power of human connection. It's a rollercoaster of emotions that'll have you laughing, crying, and everything in between. This isn't your typical love story! This novel is so well-written and full of unexpected twists you’ll keep flipping those pages. Plus, the characters are well-developed -- rounded in their complexities -- that you'll feel like you've known them forever. So, if you're ready for a wild and adventurous ride, grab a copy of this modern-day classic ASAP!"
Zaheer Baber, Professor of Sociology at University of Toronto, said, "Madeen's storytelling prowess shines through and resonates with authenticity. The characters, particularly Assam, are beautifully developed, challenging traditional stereotypes as in presenting a more nuanced and genuine portrayal of African culture.”
Elizabeth Montano, author of The Eternal Dawn Trilogy, called it "a novel so beautifully and realistically written I found it on par with works by whom we consider masters … Hemingway definitely comes to mind."
Eric Madeen writes cross-genre, and is the author of several books:
Tokyo-ing! - This is an apt title for this bestselling trio of tales chiming with anyone even slightly interested in Asia’s or rather the world’s most dynamic megalopolis and its glazing of layers – be they cultural or taking-wing exuberant. Madeen does deep dives in three fascinating directions and voices, including the persona in first-person female. Then doesn’t let readers come up for air because they don’t want to - until the delicious end.
Asian Trail Mix: True Tales From Borneo to Japan is a bestselling travelogue mixing it up on the Asian Trail in a voice that's by turns personal, passionate and ohhhh so very soulful. "So I get up at dawn and marvel at fog burning off into mist tumbling down like the finest mosquito netting of silk. The hills beyond the rivers' confluence, like shoulders of a woman undressing, the way the misty shroud lifts off feminine curves, higher and higher ... I tingle all over, feeling there on Borneo the dream tug of Joseph Conrad's fiction, notably his early Malaya Quartet therein Lord Jim."
By turns literarily pathbreaking and intimate, this smorgasbord of travel essays scales down the sprawl of Asia by focusing on the unique and revelatory in gemmy prose. See up close and personal the razzmatazz of novice monks at play in northern Laos, the bonding with hustling pedicab drivers in Ho Chi Minh City, the rainforests blazed on gutsy treks across Borneo and Thailand's Elephant Island and novel things Japanese. Served up nice and spicy, Asian Trail Mix is slathered across 12 rocking-it essays plus a tall tale at its glorious ending, making for a baker's dozen of sumptuousness.
Tennis Clubbed, Snubbed and Rubbity-Dub Dubbed is his third novel. In historically rich Yokohama, where Captain Perry and his Black Ships cracked open Japan, the wicked shiver of the tennis snub in the postmodern present pits David Adams against K: a puffed-up xenophobic tyrant who rules over the courts of a club that has as its anthem, ironically, the promotion of international friendship, modelled on the world’s 2nd oldest tennis club on whose board Madeen had the privilege of serving.
‘Water Drumming In The Soul: A Novel Of Racy Love in the Heart of Africa' will be available at no charge in e-book format August 31 through September 2, 29, 2026 at https://www.amazon.com/stores/Eric-Madeen/author/B08VGRNJVW.
Eric Madeen is available for media interviews and can be reached at ericmadeen777@gmail.com. All of his books are available at Amazon. More information is available at his website at https://ericmadeen.org.
About Eric Madeen:
Eric Madeen is a recently retired associate professor of modern literature at Tokyo City University and an adjunct professor at Keio University. He's an award-winning author of six books. His writing has been published widely -- in Time, Asia Week, The East, Daily Yomiuri, Tokyo Journal, Kyoto Journal, Metropolis, Mississippi Review, ANA's inflight magazine Wingspan with its 350,000 some monthly readers, Peace Corps Worldwide, East Of The Web, Japanophile, Yomimono, The Pretentious Idea, Tombstone Epitaph, several anthologies, academic journals, therein his seminal essay "Under Western and Eastern Eyes" jointly published by the Ministry of Education of the Western Federation, Russia, and the Joseph Conrad Foundation, USA, and so on.
Madeen has been featured in several radio interviews and podcasts, notably Fascinating People, Fascinating Places, about the late Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Dr. Albert Schweitzer and his creation of a durable hospital in Lambarene, Gabon. Madeen’s investigative feature of the polymath Schweitzer and his enduring hospital won him a Profile in Citizenship from Peace Corps Worldwide. Madeen once made his living copywriting for what was then the world's largest ad agency Dentsu, for clients as diverse as Mazda, Subaru, Canon, Konica, Nikko Hotels International and Sony.
Just out of the University of Arizona which made him as a penman, Madeen served for 2.3 years as a Peace Corps volunteer in Francophone Gabon, Africa, where he built a primary school complex in an equatorial village surrounded by rainforest, a mind-blowing experience which inspired his first novel, Water Drumming in the Soul, shelfed not only in the Permanent Collection of Books by Peace Corps Writers in the Library of Congress but many readers’ hearts.
Contact:
Eric Madeen
https://ericmadeen.org
ericmadeen777@gmail.com
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