This entry from the Historical Dictionaries of the Americas series is an entirely new volume; a previous version by a different author appeared in 1973. . . . The more than 700 entries in the dictionary vary in length from a short sentence to a few pages and cover people, places, culture, politics, the economy, and more. The topics cover quite a bit of territory, from the kaqchikels (a large Maya ethnic and linguistic group), to Nobel Peace Prize winner Rigoberta Menchu, to Protestantism. Entries include generous cross-references. In the case of Catholicism, for instance, the list of see also references is longer than the entry itself. The book concludes with an extensive bibliography, divided into sections starting with an introduction and including materials on topics from the pre-Columbian period to the twenty-first century. A fair percentage of these materials refer to Spanish-language publications. Recommended.

American Reference Books Annual

The dictionary itself is an impressive achievement, combining biographical, architectural, artistic, historical, documentary, and linguistic information.

Hispanic American Historical Review