Ada Ferrer

This is a book that needed to be written as it fills a gaping hole in the American History sorry. That is the never-ending relationship between the island and the United Staes from colonial times till the present. It includes well known episodes like the Spanish American War and the Cuban Missile Crisis. but there is so much more including the South's friendly relationship with Cuba during the Civil War period because they were still open to slavery. Another interesting theme is how gangsters descend on Cuba during prohibition as a profit maker as they are allowing alcohol and gambling. A great book.… (mais)

It sounds like overkill to call an academic history "brilliant," but this book blew me away. It's an examination of slavery and the plantation economy in Cuba in the light of the Haitian Revolution. You do have to read it carefully, but it's also filled with fascinating anecdotes and characters. Highly recommended if you're at all interested in Haiti, or Cuba, or the history of slavery and abolition in general. (And seeing Black Panther while reading this book made me wish so much for a big splashy Hollywood epic about Toussaint Louverture.)… (mais)