Rating: 
Summary: Reading Michener is Pure Joy
Review: Michener managed to pack quite a bit of information into this book, starting from the peaceful Carribs and ending in 1989 on a Caribbean Cruise. Throughout the story we see slave revolts, ship battles, shifting domination from Spanish to English and French, interview Castro, meet a Rastafian, and much more. Michener is a master storyteller and like his book Hawaii, we get taken on a journey through time, with a beautiful backdrop
Rating: 
Summary: Michener blinded by his own assumptions.
Review: Michener once again poses as objective historian whilst force-feeding his own narrow-minded assumptions on anyone still reading his books. Although CARIBBEAN has some interesting sections, the author's thinly-veiled prejudices come shining through. The book is nearly half over before the narrator gives any attention to a single black character. His dismissal of Carib Indians is shallow and redundant. And he completely trashes Rastafarianism as a deliberate attempt to misread scripture in order to get high and scare whitey. This last dose of intolerance is utterly indefensible. Coming from the author who defended the rights of white South Africans to seize and oppress, CARIBBEAN gives thoughtful readers one more reason to discard Michener's imitation scholarship and reach for some real wisdom instead.
Rating:
Summary: "New Lands of Ordinary Clay"-Ranjit Banarjee
Review: Michener published this work in 1989 three years before the 500th anniversary of Columbus' discovery of the new world. I totally loved this book, although as is true of all his books, they are always lengthy, trying works laden with information. I'm always glad when I finish a Michener book, but that doesn't mean I didn't enjoy reading it. They're always educational, very well researched. My mother's and my favorite Michener is The Source based on Tel Megiddo in Israel. But I love this one too, and I think understanding the events that have transpired here once the Europeans set up shop, is particularly instructive. In the back of my mind I have that quote Vince Hubbard fished out for his book on Nevis, "to ignore the West Indies is to get a lopsided and unhistorical view of the mercantilist empire of the eighteenth century."!!!!! Ranjit Banarjee has written a book Prospect for the Caribbean which may begin to answer some of the questions I asked in my review of Hubbard's book on St. Kitts. An entire chapter, Chapter 13, entitled The Scholar, is devoted to his life. A Trinidadian bred West Indian of East Indian ancestry, Mr. Banarjee was educated at the West Indian University in Jamaica and in Miami, Florida. My title for this review is an excerpt from a sonnet he wrote about Columbus' discovery when he was 15. The last 6 lines I really love: 'It was strange treasure that he found this day,
Columbus of the never-bending mind:
Not gold or silver or the facile kind
Sought by his queen, who lusted for Cathay.
He found new lands of ordinary clay
Two continents of hope for all mankind.' He also wrote a poem about Alexander Hamilton; he, like other peoples of the Caribbean are inspired by Hamilton's story, as an immigrant who succeeds in the States. Banarjee does not succeed in the States, but you will need to read the book to find out why! (The scams that go on in the States and in these beautiful waters)!!! So many European powers have scoured the Caribbean sea since 1492: the British, the Dutch, the Spanish, the French, the Danes. What makes this book so monumental is that, in Michener fashion, no stone is left unturned and accomplished in a small book given the enormous amount of material that's covered in it. The Panama canal region and other strategic points along central and South America are not left out of the story, even though geographically they seem to merely rim the Caribbean Sea, and neither are lesser important, but culturally significant aspects of present island activities like cricket, voodoo, zombies or Rastafarian's ramblings! I also enjoyed the chapters on the Spanish and French islands, was a little disappointed that Cuba's history mostly covered Castro's later years. I'd really like to know what transpired there in the 100 to 200 years previous to Castro's rule. I was most moved by the tenth chapter entitled The Tortured Land which covers events on Haiti during the French revolution and Napoleonic years. I learned that Haiti was the first black republic in the world! Found myself in awe of the bravery and skill of Generals Toussaint and Vaval, disgusted in the previous chapter when a portable guillotine is lovingly brought to Guadeloupe by a devout Jacobin revolutionary. (I believe I've said before, but must repeat again, Jacobin is NOT THE SAME as Jacobite!!!) The poor French and poor Haiti, it's so tragic what has happened and is happening there today. A descendant of Vaval asked another academic colleague, "have you ever heard about the terrible international debt that France hung around the neck of Haiti at the granting of independence in 1804?.....A Haitian historian told the truth: "We spent most of our energy in the nineteenth century repaying France, and our nation fell so far behind in all social services that it could never catch up." Seems important news to me, since my hero from Nevis, Alexander Hamilton, was killed the year before, and the Louisiana purchase was transacted between Napoleon and Jefferson in 1804. Napoleon and France eager to basically give their land in the present United States away for pennies. What troubles me most about these beautiful isles, is the unconscionable, inhumane acts that have plagued them for so many centuries there. And violence continues. Flying from Nevis to San Juan on my last trip, I was amazed that from 10,000 to 20,000 miles up in the air, I could see the bottom of the ocean the entire time of my flight!!!! Some of the acts of violence done there as equally shocking as those done to the Armenians in WWI or Jews in the camps in the 30's and 40's of this last century. I forgot to mention in my St. Kitts review, the shady practice of gun-running which happens sometimes too, the most famous being the Iran/Contra affair. I've been told that America's revolutionary war was greatly helped by the smuggling of guns from the island of Statia off St. Kitts. Whether that's true or not, I'm unsure. Perhaps it isn't paradise, if violence will continue to be condoned, incited, or worse yet, deliberately planned!!!! And, if Miami will ever be the capital of the Caribbean, with people being shot and killed, selectively, while waiting for a green light on an American street, (see Chapter 15), I'm outta here. My next Michener book to read is Space!!!!! Can we see, as Banarjee does, how all of the Americas, the Caribbean included, can be 'continents of hope for all mankind'?
Rating:
Summary: AS GOOD AS TEXAS AND CHESAPEAKE..................
Review: MY FAVORITE MICHENER BOOK IS CENTENNIAL, THEN ALASKA, BUT THIS
BOOK RANKS UP THER WITH THEM. I HAVE A HARD TIME PUTTING IN
DOWN AND LOVE GETTING BACK TO IT. IT IS WRITTEN WITH COLOR AND
MUCH HISTORICAL ACCURACY. THERE ARE MANY INTERESTING "BITS" IN
THE STORY THAT YOU MISS IN DRY HISTORY. AN YET YOU FEEL AS IF
YOU ARE WATCHING ALL THIS ACTION AND INTRIGUE HAPPENING BETWEEN
ALL THE DIFFERENT CHARACTERS THAT MADE UP THIS COLORFUL TIME IN
THE HISTORY OF ONE OF THE MOST BEAUTIFUL PLACES IN THE WORLD.
I HIGHLY RECOMMEND THIS BOOK............
Rating:
Summary: AS GOOD AS TEXAS AND CHESAPEAKE..................
Review: MY FAVORITE MICHENER BOOK IS CENTENNIAL, THEN ALASKA, BUT THIS
BOOK RANKS UP THER WITH THEM. I HAVE A HARD TIME PUTTING IN
DOWN AND LOVE GETTING BACK TO IT. IT IS WRITTEN WITH COLOR AND
MUCH HISTORICAL ACCURACY. THERE ARE MANY INTERESTING "BITS" IN
THE STORY THAT YOU MISS IN DRY HISTORY. AN YET YOU FEEL AS IF
YOU ARE WATCHING ALL THIS ACTION AND INTRIGUE HAPPENING BETWEEN
ALL THE DIFFERENT CHARACTERS THAT MADE UP THIS COLORFUL TIME IN
THE HISTORY OF ONE OF THE MOST BEAUTIFUL PLACES IN THE WORLD.
I HIGHLY RECOMMEND THIS BOOK............
Rating:
Summary: AS GOOD AS TEXAS AND CHESAPEAKE..................
Review: MY FAVORITE MICHENER BOOK IS CENTENNIAL, THEN ALASKA, BUT THIS
BOOK RANKS UP THERE WITH THEM. I HAVE A HARD TIME PUTTING IT
DOWN AND LOVE GETTING BACK TO IT. IT IS WRITTEN WITH COLOR AND
MUCH HISTORICAL ACCURACY. THERE ARE MANY INTERESTING "BITS" IN
THE STORY THAT YOU MISS IN DRY HISTORY. AN YET YOU FEEL AS IF
YOU ARE WATCHING ALL THIS ACTION AND INTRIGUE HAPPENING BETWEEN
ALL THE DIFFERENT CHARACTERS THAT MADE UP THIS COLORFUL TIME IN
THE HISTORY OF ONE OF THE MOST BEAUTIFUL PLACES IN THE WORLD.
I HIGHLY RECOMMEND THIS BOOK............
Rating:
Summary: AS GOOD AS TEXAS AND CHESAPEAKE..................
Review: MY FAVORITE MICHENER BOOK IS CENTENNIAL, THEN ALASKA, BUT THIS
BOOK RANKS UP THERE WITH THEM. I HAVE A HARD TIME PUTTING IT
DOWN AND LOVE GETTING BACK TO IT. IT IS WRITTEN WITH COLOR AND
MUCH HISTORICAL ACCURACY. THERE ARE MANY INTERESTING "BITS" IN
THE STORY THAT YOU MISS IN DRY HISTORY. AN YET YOU FEEL AS IF
YOU ARE WATCHING ALL THIS ACTION AND INTRIGUE HAPPENING BETWEEN
ALL THE DIFFERENT CHARACTERS THAT MADE UP THIS COLORFUL TIME IN
THE HISTORY OF ONE OF THE MOST BEAUTIFUL PLACES IN THE WORLD.
I HIGHLY RECOMMEND THIS BOOK............
Rating: 
Summary: Getting a bit long in the tooth
Review: Overall this was an interesting and informative book. From an historical perspective Michener covers all of the bases in good style. While he makes history interesting, his perspective appears slanted and euro-centric. His language, when speaking for the native population, is awkward and unrealistic. "Me go hut..., we not join them..." His take on Jamaica and the Rastas is unrealistic. He has little to say about Jamaica in the '70's, a seminal period in that island's history and a key to understanding the Caribbean.
I last read Michener a long time ago. His writing has not aged well.
Rating: 
Summary: A book of epic proportions - literally!
Review: Reader beware - 800 plus pages, so this is no book for story time. Extremely prolific, James A. Michener writes as only he can write about the Caribbean, that vast expanse of ocean surrounded by Cuba, Puerto Rico and the extensive small islands smattered across the seascape. This is a powerful history of these islands, and James Michener takes us from the 1300s when a peaceful tribe of Arawaks are horribly destroyed all the way to Castro's Cuba. This is the sort of book one would do better learning about this area from, as the author weaves plot upon plot into a brilliantly masterminded historical novel. You will learn more from this book about the Caribbean Sea and its islands than any history or geography class could give you, and you will have more fun doing it! I gave it four stars simply because with a book this size, there was bound to be some dreadfully boring parts, and there were. If it were a bit shorter in length it would lack nothing but a Pulitzer.
Rating:
Summary: Well written but too much for one book.
Review: The first few chapters of this work were absolutley riveting. However, I get the feeling that he felt the book was getting too long. It seems that the last few chapters were cut beyond recognition or he just threw them together. Many of the characters in the later chapters were barely explored. It was definitely not equal to Hawaii or Covenant
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