Author Description

Wagu people are struggling to carve a life out of the jungle on the edge of the Sepik swamps in Papua New Guinea. This true story chronicles the arrival of Wayne and Sally Dye as pioneering Bible translators to Wagu village and their struggle to adapt to this remote tribal setting with three young children. Wayne and Sally believed that their professional training as linguists and their college degrees in nursing and engineering had equipped them for this assignment. Yet they soon found that the rigor of village life required more than academic training. While teaching these westerners how to thrive in the jungle, the Wagu people learned how to protect themselves against disease. Together the villagers and the Dye family grew to understand the natural and supernatural forces at work in their world. The two groups united to form a sustainable community.Jamey Dye, the primary author, spent the majority of the first 13 years of his life in Wagu learning to fish and hunt with the young men his mother had helped rescue from the diseases that were killing the people of the East Sepik River.The events of the book occurred between 1940 and 1970 as reported through letters, stories, and memories of individuals who lived through them.