Sign up for our newsletters to receive our Best of 2024 ezine!

Book Summary and Reviews of We Are Not Able to Live in the Sky by Mara Kardas-Nelson

We Are Not Able to Live in the Sky by Mara Kardas-Nelson

We Are Not Able to Live in the Sky

The Seductive Promise of Microfinance

by Mara Kardas-Nelson

  • Critics' Consensus (8):
  • Published:
  • Jun 2024, 400 pages
  • Rate this book

About this book

Book Summary

A deeply reported work of journalism that explores the promises and perils of microfinance, told through the eyes of those who work in small-scale lending and women borrowers in West Africa

In the mid-1970s, Muhammad Yunus, an American-trained Bangladeshi economist, met a poor female stool maker who needed money to expand her business. In an act known as the beginning of microfinance, Yunus lent $27 to 42 women, hoping small credit would help them to pull themselves out of poverty. Soon, Yunus' Grameen Bank was born, and very small, often high-interest loans for poor people took off. In 2006, Yunus and the Grameen Bank won the Nobel Peace Prize "for…creat[ing] economic and social development from below."

But there's a problem with this story. There are mounting concerns that these small loans are as likely to bury poor people in debt as they are to pull them from poverty, with borrowers from India to Kenya facing consequences such as jail time and forced land sales. Hundreds have even reportedly committed suicide.

What happened? Did microfinance take a wrong turn, or was microfinance flawed from the beginning?

Mara Kardas-Nelson's We Are Not Able to Live in the Sky is a story about unintended consequences, blind optimism, and the decades-long ramifications of seemingly small policy choices, rooted in the stories of women borrowers in Sierra Leone, West Africa; their narratives are set against the rise of Yunus's vision that tiny loans would "put poverty in museums," explored through a deep history of modern international development. Kardas-Nelson asks: What is missed with a single, financially-focused solution to global inequity that ignores the real drivers of poverty? Who stands to benefit and, more important, who gets left behind?

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Reviews

Media Reviews

"[An] eye-opening debut exposé ... Kardas-Nelson's crisp characterizations and novelistic storytelling bring clarity to a sprawling, shadowy history. The result is a devastating look at a disaster set into motion by misguided American policymakers." ―Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"A keen examination of the rise and fall in popularity of the microfinance loan system... This thoughtful deep dive into the world of microfinance is both educative and heartbreaking." ―Kirkus Reviews

"Through a dazzling, superbly paced combination of astute history and on-the-ground observation in Sierra Leone, West Africa, Mara Kardas-Nelson holds the claims of microfinance up to the light. I wish that every new idea touted as the solution to the world's problems had such a thoughtful and compassionate examination." ―Adam Hochschild, bestselling author of American Midnight and King Leopold's Ghost

"What happens to money loaned to extremely poor people? Who gains and who loses? In her exhaustively researched tour de force, Mara Kardas-Nelson explodes myths – in some cases, lies – bringing tough truths to microfinancing, high-interest loans, and even the Nobel Prize. We Are Not Able to Live in the Sky should be mandatory reading for everybody looking for solutions to extreme poverty." ―Laurie Garrett, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Betrayal of Trust: The Collapse of Global Public Health

"By turns a fascinating global history of micro-credit and a haunting account of its effects on a handful of women in Sierra Leone, We Are Not Able to Live in the Sky traces the rise, fall and afterlife of an industry built on neoliberal fantasies, on the preening of powerful poseurs, and on the backs of millions of desperate people." ―James K. Galbraith, The University of Texas at Austin and author of Inequality: What Everyone Needs to Know

This information about We Are Not Able to Live in the Sky was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Author Information

Mara Kardas-Nelson

Mara Kardas-Nelson is an independent journalist focusing on international development and inequality. Her award-winning work has been supported by the International Women's Media Foundation, Investigative Editors and Reporters, the Richard J. Margolis Award and others and has appeared in the New York Times, the Nation, the Guardian, on NPR, and elsewhere. Mara has also spent years working in global health. Originally from the U.S., she has also lived in Canada, South Africa and Sierra Leone.

More Author Information

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

More Recommendations

Readers Also Browsed . . .

more history, current affairs and religion...

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Top Picks

  • Book Jacket
    Prophet Song
    by Paul Lynch
    Paul Lynch's 2023 Booker Prize–winning Prophet Song is a speedboat of a novel that hurtles...
  • Book Jacket: The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern
    The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern
    by Lynda Cohen Loigman
    Lynda Cohen Loigman's delightful novel The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern opens in 1987. The titular ...
  • Book Jacket: Small Rain
    Small Rain
    by Garth Greenwell
    At the beginning of Garth Greenwell's novel Small Rain, the protagonist, an unnamed poet in his ...
  • Book Jacket: Daughters of Shandong
    Daughters of Shandong
    by Eve J. Chung
    Daughters of Shandong is the debut novel of Eve J. Chung, a human rights lawyer living in New York. ...

BookBrowse Book Club

Book Jacket
The Berry Pickers
by Amanda Peters
A four-year-old Mi'kmaq girl disappears, leaving a mystery unsolved for fifty years.
Book Jacket
The Story Collector
by Evie Woods
From the international bestselling author of The Lost Bookshop!
Who Said...

Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor

Click Here to find out who said this, as well as discovering other famous literary quotes!

Wordplay

Big Holiday Wordplay 2024

Enter Now

Your guide toexceptional          books

BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.