Acclaimed filmmaker Su Friedrich takes us on an intimate and visually rich autobiographical journey through her personal journals and letters, showing her artistic influences, sense of humor, and flair for adventure as she describes a trip she took through West Africa in 1976 at the age of 21.
Features 100+ b&w drawings, photographs, and images.

In 1976, Su Friedrich, the experimental filmmaker and visual artist known for exploring themes of identity, gender, and personal narrative through avant-garde cinema, embarked on a transformative five-month solo trip through nine countries in North and West Africa. Through her letters, diary entries, and images captured in black and white on her 35mm Olympus, she documented her day-to-day encounters with the people she meets from Algeria to Nigeria (during a coup) and from Ghana to Morocco. Friedrich not only weaves a rich tapestry of Africa in the mid-1970s, but she also imbues each page with her thoughts, feelings, and discoveries. She travels south through the Sahara by hitching rides on trucks and recalls her surprise when she appeared in the central market of a town and was quickly invited to stay at the home of one of the curious locals. Thirty-nine years later, Friedrich has unearthed her journals, photographs and letters and has constructed a record of her discoveries on a journey that will resonate with readers who love to travel and fans with wanderlust.

“This book is for/about every woman on every continent who still wants, or who still fights, to be free from the bullshit proffered by the patriarchy, and to all the women who have wandered the world to find the world.” —Su Friedrich