Customer Reviews

Azucar! The Story of Sugar

5 star:		(134)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book is so beautifully written it is to be savored over time, like fine wine. It moved me deeply, delighted me in a literary sense, and was always a compelling joy to come home to. Alan Cambeira is a stellar writer; surely he could speak of the phone book and be just as mesmerising, but when the topic is the struggles of sugarcane business in the Dominican Republic, it is indeed a rare and wonderful feast. Brava to a sublime author and a worthy topic. This proves that Hispanic literature is one of the worthiest to read. I recommend it not just as a library piece, but also as a special gift for any friend with a soul...

Alan Cambeira, an exciting Dominican author, writes fiction without being outlandish. However, he is conspicuously unconventional. His words are carefully selected and positioned just right to concoct a dazzling and suspenseful tale set against the deceptive beauty of the Caribbean. His characters are shockingly real and the story itself is compelling and powerful. I highly recommend this book for those readers with a genuine interest in cross-cultural fiction.

This particular novel impresses me greatly. Not just the truly unique and multidimensional characters and the events and circumstances in which they find themselves. But also the deeper ideas and serious issues that serve as what I think is the driving force of the story itself. This is the kind of complex novel that actually provokes thought because of these underlying issues. The profit motive and greed that largely determine the behaviors and attitudes of the plantation owners, for instance, became the basis for serious discussion after finishing this novel. Cambeira gives the reader something to really think about. A Great Read.

The opening passages of this novel were shocking. The author's vivid portrait of the story's setting really grabbed and held my attention. I could easily imagine the HBO movie camera scanning the whole scene, before slowly moving in closer to capture the minutest detail on this Caribbean sugarcane plantation. Awesome movie potential! A whole new world opened up for me right before my eyes. I "experienced" so much from this book that I never knew or thought about previously. This is what a terrific book is supposed to do for the reader, right? Without exaggerating, this is an incredibly well written story.
Very Highly Recommended.

With Azúcar's Story, Dominican author Alan Cambeira's constant use of references to the African-derived religious belief system and Western Catholicism in a New World context represents what Caribbean literary critic Kamau Brathwaite has called "the literature of reconnection." Here is a very dynamic interaction of an African-descended individual with her point of origin. In Cambeira's intriguing tale of exploitation of sugarcane laborers on the Esperanza Dulce ["Sweet Hope"] plantation, as the author deliberately and ironically names the decaying plantation where the action takes place, Azúcar's reconnection with the ancestral spirit world symbolically presents vodún as ultimately the most effective stablizing force in her circumstance, thanks to her powerful and wise grandmother, Doña Fela. The author has the pivotal characters in this captivating story evoke the secret powers of their spirit world. That way, they manage to bring the necessary balance into their own lives and private space, thereby filling the void that the persistent horrors and abuses of the plantation circumstance could not. Also to give salvation and hope [Esperanza Dulce], possibly counteracting the death sentence under which they all exist. This story is bold and multidimensional. There are several levels of complexity as well. I absolutely loved everything about this story. I recommend it highly for intelligent, serious readers of contemporary fiction.

I am tremendously impressed by the multiple dimensions of the characters in this thrilling story. They are convincingly authentic and certainly not the stereotypic, one-dimensional portraits you usually seem to find in many "tropical" novels. On the contrary, these characters definitely have something very profound and philosophical to say. As in the case of the community elders Don Anselmo and Doña Fela. Some characters like Harold and Marcelo offer serious pronouncements, quite in context, against the evils of globalization and the down side of world economics. The author here is also on target when he presents the frequently misunderstood and misrepresented Hollywood versions of African-derived belief systems in the Caribbean, as well as the various rituals and practices that are normally maligned by some "outsiders." Cambeira proves that he is an "insider" and really knows how to tell a story. For the making of the movie, I hope the AfroBrazilian beauty Thais Aranju (from Telemundo's Xica) plays Azucar; Boris Cudjoe (from Showtime's Soul Food) as the mysterious Lucien; Morgan Freeman as Don Anselmo; Ruby Dee as Doña Fela; and Billy Bob Thornton as the plantation capataz. What a terrific movie this would be. People will be standing in line to see it. This is a HOT novel.

Anyone seeking to learn more about how the initial Caribbean industrial experience continues to play an integral role in the formation of today's market and how the ruthless exploitation of women factors into the entire scheme should read this novel. We are living in an era of "embedded" or controlled media and it is refreshing to see my talented Dominican brother, an amazing storyteller, tell it like it really is. As a female, I can relate to this story's realistic depictions of certain aspects of Caribbean society, but to read it from a male author (while surprising) is an indication to me that there is still hope for the human race. I highly recommend this unusual novel.

I was fortunate to attend a writers series public lecture and booksigning event while vacationing recently in Atlanta, GA. The featured speaker/writer was a Dominican author of amazing talent and presence. This was one of the most electrifying and engaging lectures I 've attended. I immediately bought Alan Cambeira's novel. Just as electrifying is this unusual and brilliantly written novel about the horrors of present-day sugarcane production in the Caribbean. The story is presented masterfully and it is compelling. The clever use of language [Caribbean Creole, French, Spanish, pidgin English] is strikingly creative.
Cambeira's inventive characaters are now etched indelibly in my mind. It was difficult for me to put down this book, so engrossed was I in its magical pull and intrigue. What a stroke of luck for me to have gone to Atlanta's Auburn Avenue Library that evening! Bravo, Monsieur Cambeira.

Wonderful reading! Cambeira's novel is a shocking eye-opener, even for somebody like myself from the region. It is full of intriguing events that keep the reader locked in and wanting more. The characters are very real and believable. The action moves in a kind of blurred fashion across time lines from the past and into the present. A skillfull way, I thought, of sustaining the suspense. Although this is really not a mystery novel. Cambeira as a writer keenly understands the region's complex cultural and social history. I fell in love with this novel. I am recommending it to everybody here in Santurce and elsewhere in Puerto Rico.

Since the early 1500s the Caribbean sugarcane plantation or ingenio has been dedicated exclusively to growing and producing its own sugarcane and sugar. This was not only an agricultural-industrial complex, but was also a small, self-contained, almost self-sufficient township. They had their own codes and laws...and their own ruthless means of enforcement. Undeniably, Caribbean plantation societies of an earlier era had some peculiarities - many of such hideous oddities still characterize the contemporary sugarcane estates in the region. The way in which the development of the sugar plantation has created seemingly unbearable stresses with both the society - is what AZÚCAR's story is all about. Looking at women of the Caribbean, we clearly see Caribbean women born into a region where all the 'major players' were 'newcomers' transported from somewhere else. The Caribbean,according to Alan Cambeira, author of this new novel, is a place of permeable boundaries and multiple identities, offering continuous redefinition of the self and of one's relationship to society. AZÚCAR! The Story of Sugar follows this pattern...and more specifically, the life of exploitation, brutality, terror, and decay of the sugarcane plantation. Azúcar's story is a frank testimony to the unmasked horrors of daily life in the batey - the dilapidated quarters that house the sugarcane workers recruited annually from different islands across the Caribbean to work the plantations. Alan Cambeira has woven a suspensefully different tale about women's 'secret powers' to defy and to revolt against all sorts of codes and laws, especially those traditionally made and excecuted by men in the region. AZÚCAR! The Story of Sugar exposes the oppression of women and the male fear of those 'powers' that men believe certain women to have.

Also recommended: ¿Quiénes son los Dominicanos? Caleidoscopio turbulento.