This remarkable book by photographer Joel Pickford, Soul Calling documents communities by mixing photographs with skillfully-written personal essays by the photographer that illuminate the circumstances in which they were taken and the people they represent. He also includes stunning first-person accounts from people he photographed, including a respected shaman. Through Pickford's photographs and stories, readers will meet the Hmong in America, women and men from isolated rural hill tribes who fought on the American side during the war in Vietnam, and were left behind when the war ended. Pickford documents the lives of families who reached refugee camps and emigrated to the United States, and others who remained in Laos. His perspective is free from political agendas. He sees with a photographer's eye and writes with the clarity and honesty of a literary journalist, a stranger whose patience and humanity gains him the trust of the people he photographs, and eventually a Hmong name and family. The book is hardbound in an 9x12" horizontal format. The photographs work beautifully as both art and documentary photography. They would gain from a larger presentation, but the text is remarkable, the book's size is convenient, the price is affordable, and the whole is an extraordinary project to bring Hmong communities to life both for non-Hmong and Hmong people (the book's graceful introduction, by Hmong-American writer Kao Kalia Yang, stresses the importance of remembering where we came from.) A highly recommended book for any community with immigrant populations, and any adult or young-adult reader with interests in art, history, photography, journalism, family, life after war, or daily life in different lands and cultures. Annotation ©2012 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)