“Some of us could only come to know ourselves by moving far from home.”

When Terry Repak and her husband moved to West Africa with two small children at the height of the AIDS epidemic in the 1990s, she seized the opportunity to connect with people of other cultures and bear witness to the ravages of the disease. 

Circling Home chronicles the adventures and challenges of raising children to be global citizens and trying to find home in countries as diverse as the Ivory Coast, Tanzania, and Switzerland. Her memoir spotlights the complexity, struggles, and profound lessons at the heart of the expat journey. Read more.

Buy Circling Home Now

Bookshop.org | Amazon.com | Barnes & Noble

Media Inquiries | Mindbuck Media

Read excerpts from Circling Home.

Attend an Author Event.

Published by She Writes Press

HPIM1167.jpg

Avid Journaler

Intrepid Traveler

Global Citizen

Author Terry Repak lived and traveled abroad for decades, meeting people who changed her life in stunning settings like Tanzania, Ivory Coast and Switzerland. Look for her travel memoir, Circling Home: What I Learned By Living Elsewhere.

Photo of Mt. Kilimanjaro by Terry Repak

 

Author Terry Repak — making sense of the world.

I’ve kept a journal since I was nine years old. As the second of seven children, it wasn’t easy to be heard or find wise adults who would discuss things and listen to me. So I wrote about issues that puzzled me and tried to figure things out on paper. And I discovered a love of books and literature early and wanted to be part of that world.

I started writing at age nine in order to make sense of the world.

— Terry Repak

On Travel

 

Once I started traveling, I found the world to be endlessly fascinating and wanted to write about everything.

Writing enabled me to commit things to memory, reflect on what I was seeing, and puzzle over the complicated issues and people I was meeting.

 

I write about nature as it’s both a solace and an inspiration to me. I prefer to be in the mountains or near the sea instead of in cities and crowded settings.

— Terry Repak

Photos by Terry Repak