Praise and Reviews

William Powers, Blue Clay People and Whispering in the Giant's Ear

William Powers

“A masterful storyteller… Powers has a keen ear for dialogue and dialect, and his prose is lovely and lyrical…[His] honesty about his own flaws places him in the congregation rather than the pulpit.”—Providence Journal

“Powers sketches scenes of transcendent beauty and grotesque violence, and writes with disarming honesty.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review

"William Powers is sensitive, reflective, and a fine stylist.”—St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Blue Clay People

“A haunting account of one man’s determination and the struggles of a people living in a deeply troubled country.”—Booklist
 
“In this painful and joyful narrative, William Powers provides a vital stratum of truth about life and foreign aid in the worst parts of the underdeveloped world.”
                                    --Robert D. Kaplan, author of Balkan Ghosts

“Powers sketches scenes of transcendent beauty and grotesque violence, and writes with disarming honesty.”    —Publishers Weekly, starred review
 
“Few authors sustain a tone of outraged hopefulness through a whole book. Dickens could, as could any number of gloomy Russians, but not many Americans. William Powers is an exception…”—Charlotte Observer
 
"A searing memoir ... recalls the literary travelogues of writers such as Mark Salzman and Bruce Chatwin.” –Jeffrey Pepper Rodgers, contributor to NPR’s All Things Considered 
 
"Blue Clay People is written in a clear style, with a narrative structure that keeps the reader's attention.”—San Francisco Chronicle

“It’s hard to criticize a new memoir called "Blue Clay People" written by William Powers…a compelling, straightforward, and heartfelt account of the author's time working as an aid worker in Liberia.... extraordinary.”—Chat the Planet Magazine

“Powers' book renders Liberia, whose normal international notice has to do with headlines of corruption or destruction, on a human scale….What people consume at one end of the Earth—such as tropical timber or diamonds— has a profound effect, because of loss of habitat and other depredations, on the well-being of creatures on the far side of the world, such as the endangered pigmy hippopotamus, Diana monkey, the viviparous toad or the zebra duiker. "Their last stand," Powers calls it, and asks readers to consider their responsibility in the destruction.”—Columbus Post-Dispatch

"William Powers is sensitive, reflective, and a fine stylist.”—St. Louis Post-Dispatch

“(Powers) has a great eye and ear for life in Africa: the people of a war ravaged country making lives from almost nothing, the lurking temptation of corruption, oddball expatriates, the vulnerability of animals, natural beauty and man-made garbage. It’s a deeply personal story, and for Powers deeply personal means thinking constantly about the rest of the world and his place in it. He can’t enjoy diamonds or fine wood, knowing where they come from, but he also doesn’t need such material luxuries. Liberia gave him something much more valuable, something the rest of the world needs very badly: a Sense of Enough.”—So Much To Read Reviews

“A remarkable memoir of an idealistic young aid worker in Liberia. It is powerful, readable, occasionally joyful, and very moving.”—Full Circle Reviews

“Powers describes the kidnappings and violence that aid workers face, and the difficulties of reconnecting with friends and family in the West….His account offers a personal side to the work done by international relief charities, and to Liberia, known more for its violence than the vitality and kindness that Mr. Powers so often encounters.”—Chronicle of Philanthropy

“Powers brings home the ambiguities of aid work that tries to bridge first and third worlds, wealth and misery, across barrels of guns and fistfuls of dollars." –Rosemary Radford Ruether, author of Christianity and the Making of the Modern Family

"Powers has thrown off Liberia's shroud of misery and terror to reveal the human spirit of a people struggling for normalcy. With his sharp eye for detail and his graceful prose, he brings a heartbeat and a face to a culture known so long only for its conflict." - Sarah Erdman, author of Nine Hills to Nambonkaha 

“Vividly drawn.” —Globe and Mail, Canada

"Bleak and beautiful.”—Atlanta Journal-Constitution

"Tragic, humorous, and penetrating..." Deborah Scroggins, author of Emma's War
 

Whispering in the Giant’s Ear, Advance Reviews:

“As an aid worker living in Bolivia, Powers did not just witness the change; he was immersed in the action, forced to juggle the country’s internal conflict with his environmental organization’s mission of saving the rain forest… What results is a deeply personal and informative chronicle of Powers’ ambitions, the Indians’ ambitions and perhaps most importantly in a country as physically diverse and dramatic as Bolivia, nature’s ambitions.” - Publishers Weekly


“Powers new book, “Whispering in the Giant’s Ear” is a rip-roaring chronicle of the struggles and compromises, doubts and determination needed to implement the Kyoto accords—an international agreement setting targets for industrialized countries to cut their greenhouse-gas emissions—in Bolivia.” - Newsweek