Haiti After the Earthquake (2011)

In January 2010, Haiti experienced a seven-point earthquake that laid waste to an already-struggling infrastructure. The world, for a few moments, paused and sighed a collective, compassionate sigh towards one of the oldest republics in the Western Hemisphere.

Paul Farmer, known for starting Partners in Health and for being deputy ambassador to Haiti from the UN under Bill Clinton, composed this book about his experiences soon after the earthquake. Paul has spent over 30 years serving this island-nation, and he knows it like few outsiders do. He shares these memories in an attempt to provide a chronological diary for the sufferings of this people and to publicize the weight of their journey.

At the conclusion of the book lies several stories from individual Haitians. It is nice to hear their patriotism intermixed with their empathetic sufferings of their fellow citizens. Clinton always raved about how resilient the Haitian people are. They will bounce back. This story - these journeys - tell exactly how this bounce-back will occur. For those interested in being more globally minded, this book is worth a read.
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Paul Farmer

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I received this book as an audiobook through the Early Reviewers Program. I don't usually listen to audiobooks, but this particular book lent itself well to the format because I just felt like I was listening to a lengthy NPR piece. It begins with Paul Farmer's account of the aftermath of the earthquake in Haiti. He describes the devastation to both physical structures, such as the hospital, and public systems, mainly due to loss of life. He also details efforts to assist the Haitians in the direct aftermath and in the months following the earthquake. One of the most interesting sections deals with a cholera outbreak that occurred several months after the initial disaster. This led to a debate in the international community over whether cholera vaccine administration would be effective or worthwhile. Farmer's assessment of the disaster as an "acute on chronic" situation serves as a warning that the scale of this disaster was not inevitable. Haiti already existed in a chronic disaster state in which public infrastructure could not sufficiently serve the majority of its people. The book continues with a variety of first-hand accounts from Haitians and foreign aid workers. These all lend different perspectives to the disaster and recovery. The overarching theme is that the international community must help Haiti to "build back better" and that this is probably best accomplished by direct assistance to Haiti's government for specific items such as teacher's salaries. The old Haiti, an underdeveloped country with a hodgepodge of uncoordinated NGOs running many of the social services, was clearly a disaster waiting to happen. ( )

Haiti After the Earthquake was an interesting listen (I was given the audiobook version). It's a very in depth look at Haiti and what happened before and after the earthquake of 2010. Most interesting to me was a peek inside Haiti's political structure and how that affected the people of Haiti during the aftermath of this great disaster. The author also brings in a number of familiar faces and "big names" to try and bring awareness to the problem. It's a great marketing technique - who doesn't love Meryl Streep? - but it also is a bit deceptive as she does not read the majority of this book.

Still, with a bit of restructuring, this book has a lot of potential. All the information is there, it just needs a bit of rearranging and pairing down. (The book is a little overly long in some places.)

Side note: Kudos to the distributors of this book. I received my copy pretty much as soon as I won it from LT's Early Reviewers Program.