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A Promised Land Synopsis
A riveting, deeply personal account of history in the making-from the president who inspired us to believe in the power of democracy
In the stirring, highly anticipated first volume of his presidential memoirs, Barack Obama tells the story of his improbable odyssey from young man searching for his identity to leader of the free world, describing in strikingly personal detail both his political education and the landmark moments of the first term of his historic presidency-a time of dramatic transformation and turmoil.
Obama takes readers on a compelling journey from his earliest political aspirations to the pivotal Iowa caucus victory that demonstrated the power of grassroots activism to the watershed night of November 4, 2008, when he was elected 44th president of the United States, becoming the first African American to hold the nation's highest office.
Reflecting on the presidency, he offers a unique and thoughtful exploration of both the awesome reach and the limits of presidential power, as well as singular insights into the dynamics of U.S. partisan politics and international diplomacy. Obama brings readers inside the Oval Office and the White House Situation Room, and to Moscow, Cairo, Beijing, and points beyond. We are privy to his thoughts as he assembles his cabinet, wrestles with a global financial crisis, takes the measure of Vladimir Putin, overcomes seemingly insurmountable odds to secure passage of the Affordable Care Act, clashes with generals about U.S. strategy in Afghanistan, tackles Wall Street reform, responds to the devastating Deepwater Horizon blowout, and authorizes Operation Neptune's Spear, which leads to the death of Osama bin Laden.
A Promised Land is extraordinarily intimate and introspective-the story of one man's bet with history, the faith of a community organizer tested on the world stage. Obama is candid about the balancing act of running for office as a Black American, bearing the expectations of a generation buoyed by messages of hope and change, and meeting the moral challenges of high-stakes decision-making. He is frank about the forces that opposed him at home and abroad, open about how living in the White House affected his wife and daughters, and unafraid to reveal self-doubt and disappointment. Yet he never wavers from his belief that inside the great, ongoing American experiment, progress is always possible.
This beautifully written and powerful book captures Barack Obama's conviction that democracy is not a gift from on high but something founded on empathy and common understanding and built together, day by day.
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Press Reviews
Barack Obama Press Reviews
What is unexpected in A Promised Land is not its literary elegance but the former president's candour -- David Olusoga - Observer
The author of Dreams from My Father - his lyrical 1995 account of his tangled mixed-race upbringing in Hawaii and Jakarta - has not lost his narrative touch. This memoir is beautifully written and disarmingly candid...leavened with telling asides, poignant vignettes, painterly character sketches and an occasional corker of a joke -- Tony Allen-Mills - The Sunday Times
Obama's is a beautifully written memoir...and covers his childhood through to the assassination of Osama bin Laden in 2011, which is written up like a thriller...it's probably the best volume of autobiography from a former president in modern times. As a reminder of a face of America it is invaluable -- Sean O'Grady - Independent,****
A classy book and not just one for insiders...[Obama] reminds us what it was like having a sense of magnanimity and modest statesmanship in the White House. Welcome home, decency -- James Hanning - inews.co.uk
A supremely intelligent, accomplished man . . . Obama emerges as kind to his staff, devoted to his children and absolutely in love with his wife -- Tim Stanley - The Telegraph
701 pages of elegantly written narrative, contemplation and introspection, in which he frequently burrows down into his own motivations... A Promised Land delivers amply on the basic expectations of political autobiographies, providing a granular view from the driving seat of power. There are also the gratifying details observed in moments of historic import -- Julian Borger - The Guardian
Deeply introspective and at times elegiac... [it] isn't the usual post-presidential legacy-burnishing project. There is a literary grandness... and dramatic renderings of moments high and low captured in sometimes Sorkin-esque dialogue...The narrative puts the reader in the room at defining moments -- Eli Stokols - LA Times
Barack Obama is as fine a writer as they come. It is not merely that this book avoids being ponderous, as might be expected, even forgiven, of a hefty memoir, but that it is nearly always pleasurable to read, sentence by sentence, the prose gorgeous in places, the detail granular and vivid...Barack Obama has...illuminated a pivotal moment in American history -- Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie - The New York Times
Author
About Barack Obama
Barack Obama was born in Honolulu in 1961. In his early twenties he found his vocation working among poor communities on the south side of Chicago. Later he went to law school at Harvard University, where he became the first black president of the Harvard Law Review. In 1995 he published his memoir Dreams from My Father, which became a bestseller soon after it was reissued in 2004. After returning to Chicago, he was elected to the Illinois State Senate in 1996.
Barack Obama delivered the keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, and later that year he was elected to the US Senate. His second book, The Audacity of Hope, was published in 2006 and became an immediate bestseller. In November 2008 Senator Obama beat John McCain to become the 44th President of the United States of America. He is married to Michelle, with whom he has two daughters, Sasha and Malia.
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