Haiti
Discover the best books on Haiti, from Edwidge Danticat’s moving fiction like *The Dew Breaker* to gripping narratives on Haitian history and culture. Explore this curated reading list for powerful stories, memoirs, and accounts of revolution, resilience, and daily life. Perfect for readers seeking impactful Haitian literature and nonfiction.
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The Farming of Bones
by Edwidge Danticat
Memorializing the forgotten victims of ethnic cleansing in Haiti in the 1930s, this novel revolves around a Haitian-born servant girl and her lover, an itinerant sugarcane cutter, as they struggle against the violence.
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Krik? Krak!
by Edwidge Danticat
When Haitians tell a story, they say "Krik?" and the eager listeners answer "Krak!" In Krik? Krak! In her second novel, Edwidge Danticat establishes herself as the latest heir to that narrative tradition with nine stories that encompass both the cruelties and the high ideals of Haitian life. They tell of women who continue loving behind prison walls and in the face of unfathomable loss; of a people who resist the brutality of their rulers through the powers of imagination. The result is a collection that outrages, saddens, and transports the reader with its sheer beauty.
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The Dew Breaker
by Edwidge Danticat
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A "brilliant book, undoubtedly the best one yet by an enormously talented writer” (The Washington Post Book World), about love, remorse, and hope; of personal and political rebellions; and of the compromises we make to move beyond the most intimate brushes with history. In this award-winning, bestselling work of fiction that moves between Haiti in the 1960s and New York in the present day, we meet an unusual man who is harboring a vital, dangerous secret. He is a quiet man, a good father and husband, a fixture in his Brooklyn neighborhood, a landlord and barber with a terrifying scar across his face. As the book unfolds, we enter the lives of those around him, and his secret is slowly revealed. Edwidge Danticat’s brilliant exploration of the “dew breaker”—or torturer—is an unforgettable story from one of America’s most essential writers.
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Papa Doc & the Tontons Macoutes
by Bernard Diederich
Originally published in 1970, this is the story of Haiti under the rule of Dr. François Duvalier. Bernard Diederich lived in Haiti for 14 years and had personal experience of the early Duvalier days and the period of Maloire's rule. His work exposes the evil of Duvalier's rule and the tale of how Duvalier undid U.S. policy. "No one alive ... is better qualified than Bernard Diederich to tell the horrifying story of Haiti under the rule of Dr. François Duvalier," writes Graham Greene in the foreword to this edition. "What a story it is: tragic, terrifying, bizarre, even at times comic. Papa Doc sits in his bath wearing his top hat for meditating ... the head of his enemy Philogenes stands on his desk ... the hearse carrying another enemy's body is stolen by the Tonton Macoutes at the church door ... the writer Alexis is stoned to death ... This is a very full account of Duvalier's reign, which will be indispensable to future historians." -- Graham Greene (Foreword)
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Restavec
by Jean-Robert Cadet
African slaves in Haiti emancipated themselves from French rule in 1804 and created the first independent black republic in the Western Hemisphere. But they reinstituted slavery for the most vulnerable members of Haitian society—the children of the poor—by using them as unpaid servants to the wealthy. These children were—and still are—restavecs, a French term whose literal meaning of "staying with" disguises the unremitting labor, abuse, and denial of education that characterizes the children's lives. In this memoir, Jean-Robert Cadet recounts the harrowing story of his youth as a restavec, as well as his inspiring climb to middle-class American life. He vividly describes what it was like to be an unwanted illegitimate child "staying with" a well-to-do family whose physical and emotional abuse was sanctioned by Haitian society. He also details his subsequent life in the United States, where, despite American racism, he put himself through college and found success in the Army, in business, and finally in teaching.
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Brief Encounters with Che Guevara
by Ben Fountain
The well-meaning protagonists of Brief Encounters with Che Guevara are caught—to both disastrous and hilarious effect—in the maelstrom of political and social upheaval surrounding them. Ben Fountain's prize-winning debut speaks to the intimate connection between the foreign, the familiar, and the inescapably human.