"Sugar Baron is a brilliant, highly original narrative of the fluctuating fortunes of Cuba and its sugar industry during the republican period."—Franklin W. Knight, professor emeritus, Johns Hopkins University "McAvoy's 'subject' is not simply Manuel Rionda as an individual, but the entire history of U.S.-Cuban relations from the Spanish-Cuban-American War to the Revolution of 1933. Believe it or not, such a story can be told from the vantage point of this one individual, and McAvoy has done it in exemplary fashion."—Cesar Ayala, University of California, Los Angeles