Paul Clemens

2011
Nonfiction

Paul Clemens’s first book, Made In Detroit (Doubleday, 2005), was a memoir about growing up on the city’s East Side in the 70s, 80s, and 90s.  It was a New York Times Notable Book.  His second book, Punching Out: One Year in a Closing Auto Plant (Doubleday, 2011), details the dismantling of a Detroit automotive factory and the lives of the people who worked there. “Mr. Clemens weaves history, economics, politics, past and present, all into a strong, forward moving narrative,” wrote the Whiting Selection Committee. “This is a subject that the world has largely ignored – the world of work, the lives of people who work with their hands and live from paycheck to paycheck.” Mr. Clemens has also written for the New York Times and its Magazine and is the recipient of a Guggenheim fellowship. He lives in Detroit.