An excellent overview of Haitian popular music in the last century. Strong emphasis on lyrics, rather sparse on music. Attempts to weave ethnographic moments into a sweeping history, but tends to give in to an encyclopedia impulse, leaving the reader slogging tree after tree too much without a view of the forest or knowledge of the shape of the leaves. But towers above everything else ever written attempting to give a broad view of Haitian music, an eye(ear)-opener for salsa fans and others who haven't had the chance to learn about the penetrating beauty of Haitian musical culture.

Since Haiti gained its independence from the French in 1804, volatile governments stifled the country's growth. Although it was the Western Hemisphere's second democracy, the impoverished country remained islolated for many years. However, Marc Yves Regis I has written a personal and provacative story of Haiti's disenchanted poor. Regis, a Hartford Courant photographer, opens the door to Haiti's dark, brutal secrets with explicit photographs taken in his native country. During the last decade, Regis traveled back-and-forth to Haiti, an impoverished country pushed further into dispair in the early 1990s by an international embargo that was supposed to punish an illegal military government. Instead, peasant children starved because food prices rose during the U.S.-led embargo. In addition, armed paramilitary thugs controlled the poor with iron fists. Gunfire rang out each night and dead bodies lined the roads each morning. In the book, Regis uses his mother's voice to tell a poignant story of how the Haitian military and its hired thugs tortured and killed innocent people. The book outlines Haiti's democractic reforms, beginning with the 1990 appointment of the country's first woman president. A year later, Ertha Pascal-Trouillot handed power to Jean-Bertrand Aristide who captured the presidency with an overwhelming 67 percent of the vote in the country's first true, democratic election. The military, however, overthrew the fiery former priest in a bloody coup d'etat. Aristide lived in exile in a plush Washington, D.C. suburb for mare than three years until the United States, in a military show of force, restored him to power.

This well written book makes accessible a fascinating period of history -- the fate of slaves in the Caribbean after emanicipation and the further hurdles that were put in place to prevent full participatory democracy. Anyone who has doubts as to the real causes of prolonged instability in the region (Western meddling) will probably find this book enlightening and compelling.

THE CHANCE DISCOVERY OF SOME CANNON IN SIXTY FEET OF WATER LED THE AUTHOR TO DO SOME RESEARCH AND COMPEL HIM TO DIVE AND TRY AND SALVAGE WHAT WAS LEFT OF AN OBVIOUSLY OLD WRECK. A YEAR LATER, WITH HIS GIRLFRIEND AND AN OLD SALT FROM EUROPE THEY BEGAN FROM THE CONTINENT, THE TRIP IN HIS SAILBOAT TO A POINT OFF HAITI IN THE CARIBBEAN. THE STORY OF THE LONG CRUISE WAS IN ITS OWN WAY AN EQUALLY INTERESTING PART OF THE CHRONICLE; BEFORE THEY BEGAN PROBING THE MYSTERIOUS WRECK. WHAT THEY DID AND HOW HEY DID IT...THE DAY TO DAY PROBLEMS MAKES FOR A GOOD COUPLE OF DAYS READING.

Bruce Gilden's "Haiti" is a stark, dismal landscape of poverty which easily conjurs up bleak images of the Congo in Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness". Yet it is as riveting as any photographs I've seen from the likes of Salgado and Cartier-Bresson. However, unlike Salgado and Cartier-Bresson, Gilden is content to use his Leica to show viewers the truth, without seeking to portray his poor subjects in a noble, dignified light. All his familiar trademarks from "Facing New York" are here, with his extensive use of flash and odd composition, now brought to bear to show a very dark, grim view of Haitian poverty.

"Haiti," by Roseline Ngcheong-Lum, is part of the "Festivals of the World" book series. This book combines a very readable text with many wonderful full-color photographs. Also included are a map, glossary, and index. There are also instructions for making a Haitian-inspired Carnival headdress, as well as a recipe for the dessert known as blancmange.

The book explains such festivals as Carnival, Mardi Gras, Haitian Independence Day, and the Day of the Dead. A number of related topics are covered: the voodoo religion, beliefs about zombies, and the importance of Haitian heroes like Toussaint L'Ouverture. The photographs are really great: we see a statue memorializing national hero Henri Christophe, a richly decorated church interior, a colorfully decorated "taptap" (public bus), and more. Overall, a fine entry in this series.

A must-have reference for anyone coveting a piece of Haiti's "go-go" economy. Its authors do an admirably thorough job of scouring the countryside for deeply contrarian business opportunities, rather than limiting themselves to the usual suspects in Port Au Prince's industrial and technological corridor. I'll admit it - I originally bought this guide on something of a lark, specifically as a gift for our family's trustee. By way of background, the trust department of an esteemed Boston bank has been abetting the decline of the Higgensworth clan for almost a century. Each generation, a new trustee is granted absolute authority over our assets (think of it as a serial dictatorship along the lines of North Korea, with the sole oppressee being our finances). During the Eisenhower era they poured millions of Higgensworth dollars (yes, there were millions of them once) into Wham-O! Corporation stock just as the Frisbee and Hula Hoop manias were collapsing. Under Carter they bought a large stake in a Chiclets factory in Iran, which did wonderfully until Khomeini took over and turned it into an interrogation center for unveiled women. Then during the Diet Roosevelt years they stodgily stuck to treasuries and municipal bonds until March of 2000 - when they couldn't take it any more and finally bet heavily on the Internet. When I came across this book, I couldn't help but send it to our designated Mandarin over at the trust department with a peevish note suggesting that he comb it for investment possibilities. He either missed the implicit irony, or detected it and deeply resented it, because scarcely a month later I received a notice indicating that we are now 1/17th owners of a chicken processing plant just outside of Verrettes - a small industrial center in Haiti's Artibonite province. Haitian poultry processors are said to enjoy tremendous efficiencies, since local religious practices create high demand for exotic internal organs that Americans don't buy. For this reason I am hopeful that this story will have a happy ending.

whhhhhoooooo

excellent book

The lack of courage and impartiality of Historian during the occupation leave us a lot of unanswered question about the behavior of the haitian elite. Jean Price Mars tells it as it was. He tells us from primary sources how the occupation was a turn over of the indigenious power to a power that control by the elite and the imperialism. If you want to know why the yankees destroyed the haitian popular indigenious army, why the americans occupied the Haitian National Bank until 1948, it is the Book to read. You will learn everything you want to know from a famous writer.