Redemption Song (book)

Redemption Song: An Irish Reporter Inside the Obama Campaign, is a book by Niall Stanage about the 2008 presidential election campaign of Barack Obama.

It was first published by Liberties Press, Dublin on December 1, 2008, so becoming one of the first books published anywhere to cover the entirety of Obama's campaign. ^[1] The author is based in New York—he is a regular contributor to The New York Observer—but was born and raised in Belfast, hence the Irish reference in the book's subtitle, and its initial release through an Irish publisher. It is distributed in North America by Dufour Editions.

Redemption Song received a generally positive critical reception upon its release, being described as "extraordinary...superbly written" by The Irish News, "terrific.... a real insider's account" by the Evening Herald^[3] and "sharp, incisive" by The Sunday Business Post.^[4]

Pat Rabbitte, the former leader of the Irish Labour Party reviewed Redemption Song for the Irish edition of the Mail on Sunday on December 21, 2008. Awarding the book four stars out of five, he said of the author, "He has written a very fine book, culminating in that magic night in Chicago when the world watched men and women cry as the results came in and hope and history seemed to rhyme." (The last phrase is a reference to a famous poem by Seamus Heaney called 'The Cure at Troy'.)

Redemption Song is broadly sympathetic to Obama. Although it includes some detail about the president-elect's early life, its focus is on the period between Obama's landmark speech to the 2004 Democratic National Convention and his election as president on November 4, 2008. It draws heavily on Stanage's eye-witness campaign trail reporting, including interviews with key Obama advisers, old friends and grassroots volunteers.

Notes

1. "Race to Press" http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/1208/Race_to_press.html, Politico.com, 12-01-2008

2. "The Belfast Man and Barack" http://www.irishnews.com/appnews/616/613/2008/12/6/604767_365743123290TheBelfas.html, The Irish News (Belfast, Northern Ireland), 12-06-2008

3. "The Fas Show" http://www.herald.ie/opinion/comment/the-fas-show-1560330.html", Evening Herald (Dublin, Ireland), 12-03-2008

4. "Obama's Victory Through Irish Eyes" http://www.thepost.ie/post/pages/p/story.aspx-qqqt=BOOKS-qqqm=nav-qqqid=37971-qqqx=1.asp. The Sunday Business Post (Dublin, Ireland), 12-07-2008