The World As It Is

A page-turning, unfiltered, altogether human look at Barack Obama’s presidency. Ben Rhodes — one of Obama’s closest and most important advisers — opens up the defining issues of the presidency: from the role of race and the rise of conspiracy theories to the hunt for bin Laden, the Syria "red line" debate, and the secret negotiations Ben himself led to normalize ties with Cuba. Insightful, funny, and moving, this is a beautifully observed, essential record of what it was like to be there.

Samantha Power, Former United States Ambassador to the United Nations

This stylish, beautifully writtenpolitical memoir reminds us that the local and the universal are intimately braided. Ben Rhodes steps into the river of history and charts a course through some of the most significant and alarming landscapes of our times. In this meditation on story-telling and power, Rhodes helps make sense of the bewildering times we currently inhabit. Alongside President Obama, he shakes us out of the ruts of ordinary perception and manages to find hope in the face of most available evidence.

Colum McCann, author of Let The Great World Spin

Ben Rhodes is one of the most brilliant minds and powerful storytellers I’ve ever known. In The World As It Is, he doesn’t just bring you inside the room for the key moments of Obama’s presidency, he captivates you with the journey of an idealistic young staffer who becomes the President’s close friend and advisor – a journey that both cynics and believers will find riveting and hopeful.

Jon Favreau, former Director of Speechwriting for President Obama

Ben Rhodes … has written a book that reflects the president he served — intelligent, amiable, compelling and principled … a classic coming-of-age story, about the journey from idealism to realism, told with candor and immediacy … There are anecdotes galore, but they illuminate rather than scandalize … Ben Rhodes is a charming and humble guide through an unprecedented presidency … As a result, his achievement is rare for a political memoir: He has written a humane and honorable book

New York Times

Vivid, lucid, enjoyable ... A compelling account of life in the Obama White House

Justin Webb, The Times

Taut, compelling.

Peter Conrad, Observer

More than any other White House memoirist, Rhodes is a creature of the man he served

George Packer, New Yorker

This is that rare beast, an engaging and wonderfully written book on foreign policy

Steve Bloomfield, Prospect

[Ben Rhodes’s] achievement is rare for a political memoir: he has written a humane and honourable book

Joe Klein, Scotland on Sunday

Ben’s one of the few who’ve been with me since that first presidential campaign. His memoir is one of the most compelling stories I’ve seen about what it’s actually like to serve the American people for eight years in the White House

BARACK OBAMA

Part of the charm of Rhode’s story is that he doesn’t try to hide the extent to which this was largely about his own crisis of identity. The book is engagingly honest in its self-centredness… Rhodes understands the anomalousness of his own situation

David Runciman, London Review of Books

Rhodes explores some of the darker elements of speechwriting… [and shows] communications is often a battle between a two-dimensional and a three-dimensional view-point

David Pitofsky, Times Literary Supplement