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Rating: 
Summary: terrific
Review: A comprehensive look at various historical and cultural elements of Latin America. I appreciate the scholarly, yet easy-to-read approach. Refreshing in its story-oriented approach to detail.
Rating:
Summary: terrific
Review: A comprehensive look at various historical and cultural elements of Latin America. I appreciate the scholarly, yet easy-to-read approach. Refreshing in its story-oriented approach to detail.
Rating: 
Summary: WAAAYYYYYYY TOO WORDY !
Review: As required college reading for a Latin American History course, this book was painfully long and overly wordy. Filled with descriptions on every page, the actual important facts must be navigated by the reader, making note-taking difficult and compounding the problem of "what's important" and "what's just fluff" that every student undergoes. My advice from the Professor who wholeheartedly agreed with my frustration was to skip a lot of the superfluous babble and attempt to skim for the valuable information. All in all, Crow is an historian, and enjoys lengthy dissertations. A good choice if you have LOADS of time on your hands and nothing else to read or do for a while. A much better choice for crisp and concise facts on the Central and South American regions is MODERN LATIN AMERICA by Thomas Skidmore and Peter Smith.
Rating: 
Summary: great book
Review: I have read this book many times. It was my reference bibile as i majored in Latin American Studies. Although long it is an easy read. Crow does what many other authors fail to accomplish, he maintains his objectivity. It is a good book for non-Latin Americans to gain insight into Latin America. Great book, dedicate a summer to it.
Rating:
Summary: A good story.
Review: My favorite history writer is Barbara Tuchman and I found some similarities between her and Mr. Crow in how they present history. They both bring a lot of the human element to history telling. I particularly enjoyed learning about Brasil's Dom Pedro II, who seems to get generally brushed over in history. One also gets a good feel for how and why the Latin American economic and political structures developed. It is extremely long, which is great for the amateur history buff, but probably not so great for the college student. He does have some obvious biases and makes a liberal amount of commentaries. His subjectivity is easy to recognize, enjoyable to read, and he often makes some good points. I appreciate that he doesn't hold back on both praise and criticism of significant people or events. I have a much broader understanding of our southern neighbors and plan to read the book again.
Rating:
Summary: A good story.
Review: My favorite history writer is Barbara Tuchman and I found some similarities between her and Mr. Crow in how they present history. They both bring a lot of the human element to history telling. I particularly enjoyed learning about Brasil's Dom Pedro II, who seems to get generally brushed over in history. One also gets a good feel for how and why the Latin American economic and political structures developed. It is extremely long, which is great for the amateur history buff, but probably not so great for the college student. He does have some obvious biases and makes a liberal amount of commentaries. His subjectivity is easy to recognize, enjoyable to read, and he often makes some good points. I appreciate that he doesn't hold back on both praise and criticism of significant people or events. I have a much broader understanding of our southern neighbors and plan to read the book again.
Rating:
Summary: As 919-page history books go, this one is very readable!
Review: Overall, I thought the book was very good. It is an extremely comprehensive look at the development of Latin American Culture and Society from pre-Mayan through the present. Crow's analysis is well documented and generally pertinent. There are palces where he is a bit excessive in the numerical or statistical evidence, but they are the exception. He does an excellent job of developing the cultural ascept of the book. His analysis of the nature of the different Latin American Societies is cogent, pervasive, and seamless. Thus, the reader is drawn naturally to the same conclusions as Crow with regards to the future of the Latin American Nations. They are the natural progression of his analysis of the culture from the beginning. There are, however, some faults with the book. First, Crow can be overly grandiloquent (Irony intended). "Why use a five dollar word when a ten-cent one will suffice?" It is a slight distraction from the points he makes. In addition, his later chapters tend to become somewhat more disjointed. There are obvious places where arguements are out of place or out of order. He interjects points on escapist literature in the middle a discussion on political reform and then moves back to political reform. No matter how interrelated the matters are, it is distracting. The final word on the book is not a criticism as much as it is an advisory. This book is long and dense. It is justified in the incredible job that Crow does coerviong the subject completely, but it may deter all but the most determined of readers.
Rating: 
Summary: dagbop
Review: Unlike Cookie 65, I don't want fast-food history, and Crow's wealth of details in this general history of Latin America is greatly appreciated. Crow gives us all the details in a very well-written fashion, because history is IN the details! The Skidmore/Smith book cookie 65 mentions is also a nice introductory volume on Latin America, very suited towards undergraduates. However, the Crow book has a greater richness of detail that will serve both the history buff and the student and/or business person seeking greater understanding of this important regional neighborhood. Highly recommended.
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