The Exile: Cuba in the Heart of Miami

by David Rieff

This is a fascinating portrait of Miami's Cuban population, the most successful group of immigrants to settle in the United States since the Jews of the nineteenth century.

David Rieff has provided an engrossing look at a group exiled from its homeland, showing how America has affected these immigrants, and what it means to become an American in the late twentieth century.

Genres: Nonfiction

224 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1993

About the author

David Rieff is an American polemicist and pundit. His books have focused on issues of immigration, international conflict, and humanitarianism.

Reviews

[Daniel · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can't imagine a better book on the topic. My grandparents were Cuban exiles who came to Miami in '61. Rieff's analysis is spot-on. Some of the insights were uncanny. I found myself thinking, over and over, How does he know all this stuff? Then I remembered Tocqueville, and how his outsider's perspective allowed him to see things insiders couldn't.... Not as exuberantly written as "Going to Miami," his other book on the topic, but very astute. The atmosphere of ambivalence and nostalgia he describes is still very much alive.

[Bibliovixen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was well-written and thorough in explanation of the politics and personal aspects of Miami's Cuban population.

The only real drawback to this book is when it was published - 1993. Things have continued to change in Miami and its various citizen populations, as well as US international politics with Cuba. About half of what was written no longer applies.

[Tracy Towley · Rating 1 out of 5]

All 147 pages could easily have been summed up in 1 page - and it still wouldn't have been interesting. Basically, the author had one tiny premise and then gave 1,000 examples of the same damn thing, over and over and over again.

[Doug Wells · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this while living in Miami and found it an excellent book helping me to understand some of the Cuba/US dynamics.