Reviews
"Gives thoughtful and sensitive attention to the mulatto story of costumbrismo, illuminating both specific and larger issues in ways that are clear-eyed about injustice, support Afro-Cubans, and honor Cubans of all colors by enlarging the understanding of Cuban literature."
--Book News
Conducts a conversation on race and nineteenth-century Cuban literary culture that is very worthwhile to hear.
--New West Indian Guide
Ocasio expertly guides the reader through the stereotypes, ethnically biased perspectives, literary tropes, and Black folkloric traditions in these accounts, weaving between them and passaged of Costumbrismo, which results in a rich, contrapuntal historical account of nineteenth-century Cuban national identity.
--Wasafari
[Ocasio] convincingly argues that through the representations of the Costumbristas, we find a sketch that permits a deeper understanding of slavery and its legacy. . .[and] the book serves as an impressive reference material, with nuanced definitions of terms from the Colonial period.
--South Atlantic Review