Eric Jennings's new study is a welcome transnational history of those who fled European fascism during the Second World War, through Martinique. Frequently overlooked in spite of a growing literature on the Caribbean Basin's relationship with the global conflict, the island was an instrumental stopping point for the conflict's refugees as the United States and Latin American governments debated their cumbersome, politicized, and anti-Semitic asylum policies. As the author demonstrates, Martinique was pivotal not merely in how Vichy France constructed its immigration policies but also in fostering the global contributions of such intellectuals as Victor Serge, Claude Lévi-Strauss, André Breton, and Aimé and Suzanne Césaire. It is because of Jennings's meticulous research that this book offers much more than just a glimpse into a place and the people in the French Caribbean caught between European fascism, racism, and colonialism.

Jennings's text is can be divided into eight chapters, four on the larger background surrounding what became known as the Martinique Route and four on those who went through the route. Chapters 1, 2, 5, and 8 center, respectively, on Vichy France's emigration policies, Martinique's emergence as a refugee site, wartime Martinique, and the end of the Martinique Route. Latin Americanists and Caribbeanists less familiar with the global aspects of World War II will appreciate this half of the book for outlining Vichy France's emigration plans and how an attempt to expel so-called “undesirables” transformed Martinique into an escape route. Although miniscule compared to the overarching crisis in France, almost 20 ships brought thousands of Jews, European antifascists, Spanish Republicans, and others into the French Caribbean. Until US and British fears of fascist saboteurs ended the brief outlet, Martinique received refugees while caught between anxious Vichy administrators, local fascist sympathizers, and Martinicans of color struggling against an unsurprisingly reinvigorated racism.

This book’s other half centers on the refugees’ experiences. Chapter 3 serves as a kind of prosopography of a few who took the Martinique Route. Chapter 4 attempts to recreate the voyages across the Atlantic, and chapter 6 delves into the refugees’ time on the island. Jennings's immeasurable research provides truly intimate insight into the relationships that emerged among those heading toward and living in Martinique, not to mention numerous other details ranging from their light provisions to their enduring the detention camp near Fort-de-France. Chapter 7, though, stands out as Jennings's most valuable piece. Here, he examines how Martinique's wartime conjuncture for European refugees and Antillean intellectuals birthed a unique intersection of Surrealism and Negritude. Whether in the Césaires and René Ménil's journal Tropiques, or the art of Wilfredo Lam and André Masson, the island facilitated worldly conversations and philosophical fusions that drew upon European, African, and Latin American ideas. Through excursions in the forest of Absalon and poetry readings at Fort-de-France cafés, prominent writers and intellectuals once an ocean apart ruminated over racism, colonialism, and far more. As Jennings demonstrates, later influential global works, most notably Aimé Césaire's Discourse on Colonialism, originated out of these unexpected transnational meetings on Martinique.

The book flows without any significant problems, thanks to how Jennings organizes his chapters. Scholars and general readers of World War II and Caribbean history could utilize any of his background chapters to add to lectures or gain more information on a specific aspect of the Martinique Route. Obviously, specialists interested in the refugees will benefit most from the second half of the text. Chapters 3, 4, and 6 stand out, not just for Jennings's work but also for how they can be easily assigned in undergraduate courses or upper-level seminars on exile, refugees, or other transnational subjects. Likewise, chapter 7 would go quite well in both in these courses and those focused on race and intellectual history.