This is a beautifully-produced books with haunting photogrpahs of a Brazil that has largely vanished. The focus is on people, and the photographer captures their humanity. Excellent analysis and history too.

The photographer, Genevieve Naylor, went to Brazil after working for the Associated Press and the Roosevelt administration's photographic corps. She brought to her assignment a wonderful eye for composition and an affection for the simple aspects of Brazilian life. This is a compelling book that is beautifully printed and handsomely presented. The author does an excellent job of setting the scene, too.

Genevieve Naylor was a PSA photographer hired by Nelson Rockefeller to travel through Brazil and document how American's wartime allies lives and worked. Her large format, beautifully printed photos reveal the texture of life in a proud and vibrant country. The author of this book provides clear and highly insightful analysis of the historical context in which to understand and appreciate Naylor's genius.

This book by one of the authors of Secret Missions, offers a pleasant and often poignant glimpe of the history of Miami's Cuban community. Rather than books of this kind, the author shows his respect for Miami's Cuban community although he does not emphasize the glittering success of its most powerful indivuduals. Rather, the book covers everyone from Peter Pan arrivals to Mariel boat people and rafters. A model study, and illustrated with wonderful cartoons and photographs.

The Authors Asis and Levine have created an excellent documentary of the Cuban immigration to Miami-Dade county. The book takes one from the 1930s to the present. It explains ins and outs the Cuban life in Miami. It is a very neutral book which neither glorifies nor demeans the Cuban immigration to Miami and Florida. It simply explains the reasons of Cuban behavior which might seem somewhat confusing to a non-Cuban as well as other races and nationalities from Latin America.

Miami and Cuba had a long relationship way before the revolution came to the island nation. Many of the wealthy sugar barons, rum distillers and tobacco kings kept their cash in South Florida. Miami was the playground for the rich and famous of Cuba usually occupying more hotel space than the rather well known northern snow birds of today.

The politics of dislocation is discussed indepth to help one understand the often hostile position of Cuban-Americans toward Castro and Cuba today. Something of a surprise for me was the way the first wave of exiles often viewed the newcommers of the second wave commanly known as the Marielitos with suspicion.

The influence of wealthy Cuban businessmen of yesterday and today are felt in many places of the US in Finance, Educational Scholars, Politics and Government. They superficially touch base on this without going into a lot of detail but it still one understand from where they have come from to where they are going.

The Catholic church plays a very important role in almost all Cubans' lifes. Many of the cultural and religious specific traditions are explained in great detail. All of the refugees from the first wave and operation Pedro Pan were mainly cared for by Catholic charaties, which also reinforces their beliefs and support for the church.

Gloria Estefan, Willy Chirino, Silvio Fontanellas and other Cuban-Americans who have contributed to Cuban culture in the area of music and arts is only briefly discussed on several pages. As a passionate listner of Cuban music, I thought it would have been great if they would have introduced other Cuban musicians in South Florida but then again, this is not a publication about Cuban music.

Exiles love to dream about the Island but I think this chapter is a little bit niave as most of the Cubans think that once Castro is gone they will all return home. I have been in Europe during the fall of the wall and many of the former East Germans dreamt about going back to their former country and rebuilding their homes and reuniting their families. This all turned out to be falacy. Those that tried to come back and claim their property were detested by their families who remained in the Communist part and saw their relatives from West with a lot of suspicion. Many family reunions didn't last long and the their dreams were shattered. Things will be different when Castro is gone but it will not be like most Cuban exiles think. Family members who have stayed in Cuba the entire time will want to have their property as well, citing the suffering they have endured under Castro as their rights to the deeds. More important is that exile Cubans understand what caused the revolution and that they try to avoid the pitfalls of their predecessors.

Most companies prepare a business plan and if it is not bearing fruit after a certain amount of time they decide to try something else. Perhaps the Cuban exile community should try and persue a dialogue with Cuba. Fourty years of isolation hasn't worked guys.

Excellent! This book manages to provide a comprehensive textual documentary of the Cuban exile experience in Miami in an easy-to-read manner. It accomplishes this with its great visual exposition of photographs ranging from the early 1900's to the present time, as well as a thorough analysis of this group's migration to this country.

For those interested in understanding the Cuban-American experience, especially after the Elian Gonzalez events, this book is a must. Ironically, and it gives it more credibility, this book was written prior to the Elian saga. Yet, I think it can help answer to others why this group of opinionated, passionate, and often stubborn Cuban-Americans have reacted the way they have on the Elian debate. It indeed answers a lot of questions regarding the political, economic, and social idiosyncrasies of Cuban-Americans. Answers to such questions as why Cuban-Americans are the only Hispanic group (and probably only "minority" in this country) with an overwhelming Republican Party affiliation? Why economically Cuban-Americans have been such great implementers of the "American Dream" in such a short amount of time? Why socially Cuban-Americans are closer to the American family and religious values held in the 1950s in this country?

The authors have done a wonderful job of capturing and reporting a sense of a Cuban-nostalgic state-of-mind that only exists in the Cuban-Americans' psychic, almost frozen in time. It is a testimony of perseverance and survival to the older and first generation of Cuban exiles that arrived in this country. Their main accomplishment has been to be able to pass this "dream" or state-of-mind to the next generations. The book's last page states - "In Miami, but not in Havana, you can buy a "Cuban sandwich" and "Cuban bread," Bacardi rum and Hatuey beer." This I find ironic and hopefully fitting. Who knows? It is, I think, in the end this kind of Cuban-American capitalistic mentality which might bring back to Cuba itself a sense of Cuban identity at some point in time. Not to mention of course a sense of family and religious believes kept alive by that first generation of exiles. A sense of family and religious believes that unfortunately no longer exist in that island.

Like other groups of immigrants to this country, this book shows the Cuban-American experience as homage to the human spirit, survival, and a great tribute in itself to this great country of ours. If you're of Cuban descent and live in exile, this book will make you proud, sad, and also hopeful. If you're not of Cuban descent and living in this country, this book will make you better understand that other group of Americans residing in "Cuban Miami". And yes, it should also make you very proud of this country.

I read this book on recommmendation by a friend. Athough the language is sophisticated, the book makes Brazil in the 1890s come alive. It made me want to go out and read Da Cunha's work, too. This book is masterful and compelling, and the story it tells is tragic.

Northeast Brazil has arguably inspired more fine writing than any other region in Latin America, & Levine's book continues this tradition. The Canudos episode has had two major previous chroniclers, first Da Cunha's classic eyewitness account "Rebellion in the Backlands," & Vargas Llosa's "War of the End of the World," familiar to US readers. Levine's scholarly history does not have the literary merit of its predecessors (though it's still quite readable). But it is analytically superior, because in documenting the historical background & religious orthodoxy of the Canudos community Levine reveals his subjects as well-rounded historical actors rather than incoherent fanatics. He thus restores the humanity of this tragic episode's victims, not least by showing how they exemplified millenarian patterns found elsewhere. The well-chosen illustrations make the book visually striking too. I would not hesitate to assign the paperback to advanced undergraduates. It is the definitive modern interpretation, & ultimately it will stimulate more research & revised perspectives. We cannot ask more of a good historian.

One of the best books on this topic because it not only examines Brazil's social and political problems but sees them as the legacy of past historical events and actions. The author knows Brazil intimately and conveys a sense of compassion for its people.

Many readers know Carolina de Jesus's memior "Child of the Dark" but few knew that she wrote a second book about her bitter journey from her favela shack to the brick house of her dreams. There, she was treated just as badly as she had been when she was a scavenger for garbage in the favela. As a former Peace Corps volunteer in Brazil (too many years ago!!) I loved this book. It is riveting, unexpected, and filled with insights about how Carolina de Jesus saw the world. The editor's background description and analysis is excellent, too.

This is a marvelous study not only of a poignant African-Brazilian woman persecuted for daring to state her beliefs, but one that reveals the different ways that American (Levine) and Brazilian (Meihy) scholars perceive the problems of race in society. A must read for anyone interested in Latin American society or the history of women or of blacks in the hemisphere.

This book is a collection of short essays on Brazil. I found at least half to be quite interesting, though I probably skimmed about a quarter of them. Many of the essays frequently give a first hand account of life as a small farmer, favela resident or fisherman in Brazil. These essays capture and explain to the English reader the hopes, values and experiences of actual Brazilians. Most English readers gain their understanding of Brazil only second hand through academics or journalists. This book offers a fresh, reality based perspective on Brazil for English readers who haven't learned about Brazil outside of academia, the New York Times, or the beaches of Rio.

From exerpts of historical claims to letters from diplomats, from essays on slavery to descriptions of food, this book gives insights on the spirit and history of Brazil in easy to read snippets. A picture of a people emerges from original sources and non-academic evaluations that adds debth to what you will see when you go there.

I brought this book in Los Angeles on the way back from a trip to Disney with my children. I finished it almost when I arrived home. The book has great insight and should be read by Brazilians, because it presents things as they are, not as they are supposed to be. Maybe the book will be públished in Brazil some day. I hope so.

This story needs to be told. It shows how powerful Miami Cubans not only punished the man responsible for the process of dialogue that led to the release of prisoners from Castro's jails, but essentially elected George W. Bush president in the astonishing electoral race of that year in Florida.

I was moved by the travails of Bernardo Benes,who put his life and family at risk because insensitive right-wingers in the Cuban exile community in Miami turned him into a paraih because he dared talk with Cuba's Castro in behalf of political prisoners and dialogue.

This book masterfully exposes the venality of the right-wing Cuban exile power brokers, especially the suffocating voices of Spanish-language radio in Miami. I can attest to the fact that the book is wholly on the mark. It reveals details about the exile experience that are astonishing, and also very sad. This is the best book I have ever read on the subject, and also on the precarious, often bad-faith relationship between Washington D.C. and Havana.

This book is far more than a recitation of historical facts; it ties together the evolution of political, economic, cultural and social forces to show how Brazil came to be today. It's well worth reading; by a serious scholar, and with an excellent bibliography.

However, it presents the material from a particular viewpoint that makes its coverage somewhat selective, and possibly misleading on some topics. The underlying assumption of the book is that Brazil up until the 1990's was divided into a well-to-do politically empowered elite and an impoverished and mostly illiterate underclass, with little social mobility and no political influence. This assumption is too simplistic. At least by 1960 there was a large and thriving middle class, ranging from skilled industrial workers to well-educated professionals and a great number of independent small businessmen. Although these people were generally not rich, they could lead reasonably comfortable lives, and their political influence was (and has continued to be) much greater than Levine makes clear. For example, the social unrest that led to the military 1964 coup against President Goulart was most prominent in the middle class; I can testify to that because I was there while the strikes, demonstrations and protests were becoming more and more vigorous during 1961, '62 and '63, and I saw where the impetus was coming from.

A key fact that few Americans know (and even many Brazilians don't know) is that over the last 200+ years, the average rate of growth of GDP in Brazil has been higher than the average rate of growth of GDP in the United States. This is not immediately obvious, because Brazil still lags so far behind the USA in GDP per capita; it's explained by the fact that in the late 18th century the USA was already comparatively prosperous, whereas almost all Brazilians lived in abject poverty. So Brazil has been playing catchup, and has come a long ways, although still with a long way to go. Levine fails to point this out. He also writes as if the economic progress since the 1930s has only benefitted the elite, and this is just not so; much of the economic progress has been a steady enlargement of the middle class.

He also fails to point out the extent to which Brazil is now competitive in the world economy. Brazil has exported hundreds of commercial aircraft to the United States; it supplies a significant fraction of US imports of pharmaceuticals; it exports machine tools to Germany; it exports automobiles to many coutries; it exports military hardware such as armored personnel carriers to a number of countries; and so on. To be sure, it also exports plenty of commodity raw materials, but the recent economic stability in the face of falling commodity prices in the world market is largely due to Brazil's high-tech exports.

So, in short, this is a fine book, and I recommend it wholeheartedly, but read it with the understanding that it only gives part of the story.

This new book is great because it is lively, emphasizes the most important issues, and shows a great deal of compassion for Brazil's people. The section on the recent past is extraordinary. It clarifies things that I, a Brazlian, did not know.

Bitita's Diary, from Brazil, is an interesting and easy to follow factual book. They way life was for Bitita and her family is so vastly different than my own experience that it helped open my eyes to the world and the ways things are for some people in different places. She writes of her life when she was younger, always being inquisitve and wanting to help her fellow man. She is a bright girl with many grown up thoughts about the world- even if they are stated in a way that a child would express themself. She is a strong woman in a time of great gender, race, and class discrimination. It is a testimonial of her life trials and of the people and way of life surrounding her. Carolina Maria de Jesus spoke out and paved the way for future women by writing this book, even though it was widely criticized at the time. A must read.

I felt that the book Bitita's Diary by Carolina Maria de Jesus was an excellent testimonial about a young girl growing up in Brazil during the early 1900s. As a young girl living in the favelas near Sacramento, she faced many hardships because of her race, gender, and class. She was discriminated in every which way because she was a women of darker skin who belonged to the lower class. Throughout all the obstacles that she faced in life, she still seemed to conquer the impossible. She recieved an education which helped to succeed in life. I really did enjoy this book because Bitita took you on a journey through her thoughts and feelings. She forced you to endure the suffering that she felt during her hard times, yet she also let you enjoy her happiness during good times. What I also enjoyed about the book is that by it being testimonial it challenges "offical history." Many time there is only one side to the story, but through Bitita's writing, one can see how a young girl of the lower class viewed the Brazilian Revolution of 1930 differently than others.

Bitita's Diary by Carolina Maria de Jesus is a wonderful testimonial depicting the life of a poor, black, Brazilian woman. Bitita takes the reader first hand through her life from a young girl to a mature woman. Most importantly, this book opened my eyes to class, gender, and race relations in Latin America. Not only is Bitita discriminated against because she is black, but she also feels discrimination because she is poor and a woman. Despite her misfortunes and sicknesses, Bitita becomes quite educated (mainly self-taught). Through Carolina Maria de Jesus' style of writing, the reader can see just how spunky and inquisitive of a child Bitita was. The innocence of a child can see truths and wrongs quite easily, unlike us adults. Not only does Bitita question these wrongs - she argues them loudly and openly. For this, I admire Bitita. This book was an easy read because of the author's frankness and honesty. The background settings were well explained which lead to the complete understanding of why Bitita acted the way she did. I recommend this book to anyone who is interested in Latin American culture, or the plight of gender, class, and race issues.