Moving from the micro to the macro, [the authors] tell the stories of their Yamhill friends and others they’ve met across the country, sharing their photos as well as studies and figures that deepen readers’ understanding. While they cover policy failures of the last half-century, they also affirm that we’re no longer dealing in Republican or Democratic issues, but issues of Americans’ very survival. Highlighting successful small-scale programs like Tulsa’s rehabilitative Women in Recovery program, they emphasize that there are potentially nationwide solutions. Both researched and personal, this will be hard for readers to stop thinking about.

The authors’ affection for Yamhill is the heartbeat of the book ... Tightrope avoids a problem common among books about places authors have 'escaped.' Yamhill is not reflected through a rearview mirror, distorted by a removed author’s guilt, resentment or nostalgia. Rather, it is conveyed up close by way of detailed reporting on living people — intimate access achieved because the authors, while outliers with respect to their professional status and home on the opposite coast, are also of the place ... Together, their first-person 'we' has the refreshing effect of fogging the authorial 'I' and keeping the spotlight on those they’ve interviewed or memorialized ... These stories are so numerous that we rarely get to know one person deeply. But their number conveys the breadth of financial struggle, the exploration of which took the authors to all 50 states ... reads as lived understanding ... catches what many analyses miss about struggling communities across color lines: an undercurrent of self-hatred, in which people blame themselves for bad outcomes and are loath to ask for a 'handout' ... 'Tightrope'’s greatest strength is its exaltation of the common person’s voice, bearing expert witness to troubles that selfish power has wrought.

The stories they present are mostly depressing ones ... When they let themselves express the anger they feel over the failures of the government, their writing stands out ... The book ends, helpfully, with an appendix listing suggestions for how people can make a difference in their own communities ... Tightrope is a convincing argument that it's not too late to change the course of the nation ... It's difficult to read, and it was surely difficult to write, but it feels — now more than ever — deeply necessary.

[Kristof] and WuDunn write about [Yamhill's] residents—many of whom are their friends—with affection and empathy ... The stories they tell are almost unbearably bleak ... It is at times wrenching to read. But Kristof and WuDunn, in addition to peppering the narrative with heroic individuals around the country making a difference in their communities, offer a range of sensible policy suggestions ... the authors—compassionate, solutions-oriented, and ultimately optimistic—offer a path forward.

The personal stories in Tightrope are, variously, wrenching and inspiring ... But...by its final chapter, Tightrope turns into a laundry list of standard liberal policy recommendations. America, Kristof and WuDunn say, must take steps to ensure high-quality early-childhood programs, universal health-care coverage, higher minimum wages and stronger labor unions, for instance. On these points, conservatives are unlikely to be persuaded, and liberals are unlikely to require persuasion ... Tightrope also slides over some of the toughest issues it raises ... Tightrope is earnest and oddly endearing, but often slightly muddled; the authors want to speak to conservatives as well as liberals, but they can’t quite pull off their own balancing act.

With compassion and empathy, [the authors] pull readers into the lives of families who have been in a downward spiral for several generations ... Kristof and WuDunn note that their goal is not to propose policy, but rather to share illustrative stories in order to make clear the enormity of the problem. They bring a human face to issues such as drug addiction, incarceration, family dysfunction, and declining prospects for employment. By comparing America’s policies to those of other wealthy nations, they show that solutions are available for 'escalators' out of poverty ... Enlightening for all concerned Americans, but especially for those interested in social justice issues.

With an earnest blend of shoe-leather reporting and advocacy for social justice, the married journalists send a clear message to anyone who wants to see working-class Americans prosper ... At times, the authors sound less like print journalists than like politicians or Oprah. Whatever the tone, the book is enhanced by the more than two dozen black-and-white photographs by award-winning photojournalist Lynsey Addario ... An ardent and timely case for taking a multipronged approach to ending working-class America’s long decline.

Kristof and WuDunn turn a compassionate lens on the failed state of working-class American communities in this stark, fluidly written portrait ... Kristof and WuDunn avoid pity while creating empathy for their subjects, and effectively advocate for a 'morality of grace' to which readers should hold policy makers accountable. This essential, clear-eyed account provides worthy solutions to some of America’s most complex socioeconomic problems.