Cuba: What Everyone Needs to Know (Paperback)

~ Julia E Sweig (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Excellent and... evenhanded.... [It] packs a phenomenal amount of complex history into clear and simple prose."--Los Angeles Times
"Sweig's useful ready reference is highly recommended."--Library Journal

Product Description

Ever since Fidel Castro assumed power in Cuba in 1959, Americans have obsessed about the nation ninety miles south of the Florida Keys. America's fixation on the tropical socialist republic has only grown over the years, fueled in part by successive waves of Cuban immigration and Castro's larger-than-life persona. Cubans are now a major ethnic group in Florida, and the exile community is so powerful that every American president has kowtowed to it. But what do most Americans really know about Cuba itself?

In Cuba: What Everyone Needs to Know, Julia Sweig, one of America's leading experts on Cuba and Latin America, presents a concise and remarkably accessible portrait of the small island nation's unique place on the world stage over the past fifty years. Yet it is authoritative as well. Following a scene-setting introduction that describes the dynamics unleashed since summer 2006 when Fidel Castro transferred provisional power to his brother Raul, the book looks backward toward Cuba's history since the Spanish American War before shifting to more recent times. Focusing equally on Cuba's role in world affairs and its own social and political transformations, Sweig divides the book chronologically into the pre-Fidel era, the period between the 1959 revolution and the fall of the Soviet Union, the post-Cold War era, and-finally-the looming post-Fidel era.

Informative, pithy, and lucidly written, it will serve as the best compact reference on Cuba's internal politics, its often fraught relationship with the United States, and its shifting relationship with the global community.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA (July 17, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 019538380X
• ISBN-13: 978-0195383805
• Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 5.4 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #45,897 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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  #12 in	Books > Nonfiction > Social Sciences > Political Science > Political History
  #13 in	Books > Nonfiction > Law > Perspectives on Law > Non-US Legal Systems
  #14 in	Books > History > Americas > Caribbean & West Indies > Cuba

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Terrific guide to rediscovering Cuba, July 4, 2009

By	Ken Buckingham (Chicago, Ill USA) - See all my reviews

If visiting Cuba to see more than vintage American cars is appealing, you can rely on expert Julia Sweig's new, most timely book, Cuba: What Everyone Needs to Know. Sweig's long established knowledge of Cuba together with her fun, familiar, voice-filled writing style makes this the bible for rediscovery of Cuba as the US gradually opens up the embargo-burdened bogeyman 90 miles to the South.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars page turner, July 23, 2009

By	Elizabeth Rose (Washington, DC) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I just finished this wonderful book (CUBA What Everyone Needs to Know) and I LOVED it. Ms. Sweig is a gifted writer: this book reads like fiction. Really, the book is a page turner. I learned a great deal, but it was painless -- not like an assigned reading at all. I would highly recommend CUBA What Everyone Needs to Know to students who want to learn about Cuba as well as to folks who are just looking for a good read. I read at least one American newspaper a day (usually the Washington Post) and I did not know most of the information in the book. For example, did you know that on 911 the Cuban government "privately offered to open its airfields for American planes to land there and offered medical teams to assist with the disaster and recovery."(see p. 181) I had no idea. Thumbs up for this great book.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This may well be the best book on Cuba I've ever read, July 5, 2009

By	Rifka Sanchez (Miami, FL, USA) - See all my reviews

What an unbelievable book this is. I bought it seen Dr. Sweig all over television over the past year. She comes across as one of the smartest, most charismatic talking heads on foreign policy I've seen in a generation. Her book, Cuba: What Everyone Needs To Know, is every bit as compelling. It manages to be accessible yet erudite, sweeping yet detailed, and conversational yet profound. Whether you are a Cuban history buff or want to give a friend with little knowledge of Cuba the primer of all primers, this is the book to get. I'm blown away.