With strict reference to historical documents, raw honesty, and a gripping narrative, the author reveals the crimes of powerful empires. As it is characteristically mentioned, after reading this book, "no one on earth will be able to claim the right of not knowing." It dissolves the complicity of ignorance, indifference, and hypocrisy towards international political and economic issues.

The Uruguayan author Eduardo Galeano managed to combine historical research with literary narration, creating a book that reads like a novel but is based on hard facts. In this two-volume set, the chronicle of the plundering of the continent's wealth-producing resources — from gold and silver to oil and copper — is unraveled, along with the impact this process had on the formation of Latin American societies.

Through the pages of the two volumes, the reader follows the course of Latin America through the centuries. Galeano analyzes how the wealth of the land acted as a "curse" that led to the poverty of its peoples, while simultaneously highlighting the heroic struggles for independence and social justice. This is a penetrating insight into the mechanisms of the global economy and international relations that remains more relevant than ever.