Aid organizations operate on the assumption-and-hope-that their programs eventually improve lives. Is that supported by fact, or is it an illusion, wishful thinking by those who part with "guilt" money? These were questions that motivated Chris Bale to look up friends in the region, among them a youngster from a Bangkok slum and a village woman in West Bengal. They were some people he tried to help. His search for answers was often frustrating. Faces in the Crowd : A Journey in Hope is a record of that quest. The chapter dedicated to the sugar-cane workers of Negros Island in the Philippines recalls Germinal, Zola's grim novel about coal miners in the 19th century France.