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Cuba: An American History Audiobook
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An epic, sweeping history of Cuba and its complex ties to the United States—from before the arrival of Columbus to the present day—written by one of the world’s leading historians of Cuba.
In 1961, at the height of the Cold War, the United States severed diplomatic relations with Cuba, where a momentous revolution had taken power three years earlier. For more than half a century, the stand-off continued—through the tenure of ten American presidents and the fifty-year rule of Fidel Castro. His death in 2016, and the retirement of his brother and successor Raúl Castro in 2021, have spurred questions about the country’s future. Meanwhile, politics in Washington—Barack Obama’s opening to the island, Donald Trump’s reversal of that policy, and the election of Joe Biden—have made the relationship between the two nations a subject of debate once more.
Now, award-winning historian Ada Ferrer delivers an ambitious and moving chronicle written for a moment that demands a new reckoning with both the island’s past and its relationship with the United States. Spanning more than five centuries, Cuba: An American History provides us with a front-row seat as we witness the evolution of the modern nation, with its dramatic record of conquest and colonization, of slavery and freedom, of independence and revolutions made and unmade.
Along the way, Ferrer explores the sometimes surprising, often troubled intimacy between the two countries, documenting not only the influence of the United States on Cuba but also the many ways the island has been a recurring presence in US affairs. This, then, is a story that will give American readers unexpected insights into the history of their own nation and, in so doing, help them imagine a new relationship with Cuba.
Filled with rousing stories and characters, and drawing on more than thirty years of research in Cuba, Spain, and the United States—as well as the author’s own extensive travel to the island over the same period—this is a stunning and monumental account like no other.
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“Ferrer’s astonishing Cuba succeeds brilliantly with an original approach, written in two voices, folded together seamlessly.”
— David W. Blight, Pulitzer Prize–winning author
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“[A] nuanced history of the island nation and its often troubled dealings with its gigantic and voracious neighbor.”
— Kirkus Reviews (starred review) -
“A balanced, revelatory, and thoroughly enjoyable exploration of the complex history of this endlessly fascinating country.”
— Henry Louis Gates, Jr., New York Times bestselling author
Cuba Listener Reviews
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David Center, 12/13/2024
About Ada Ferrer
Ada Ferrer is the author of the Pulitzer Prize winner Cuba: An American History, as well as Insurgent Cuba: Race, Nation, and Revolution, 1868–1898, winner of the Berkshire Book Prize for the best first book by a woman in any field of history, and Freedom’s Mirror: Cuba and Haiti in the Age of Revolution, which won the Frederick Douglass Book Prize from the Gilder Lehrman Center at Yale University as well as multiple prizes from the American Historical Association. She is Julius Silver Professor of History and Latin American and Caribbean Studies at New York University, where she has taught since 1995. Born in Cuba and raised in the United States, she has been traveling to and conducting research on the island since 1990.
About Alma Cuervo
Alma Cuervo is an Earphones Award–winning narrator and a stage actress and singer who has also performed in film and television. She holds an MFA in acting from the Yale School of Drama, from which she graduated in 1976 alongside Meryl Streep. She starred in the role of Madame Morrible in the first national tour of Wicked.