The Golden Harvest is one of Amado's works set in the cocoa-growing areas of the state of Bahia and concerning the society that grew up around this crop.

[1] It is essentially a continuation of The Violent Land but in the 1930s, when the novel is set, the cocoa economy is already showing signs of civilization, with greater respect for the law and commercial contracts.

Nevertheless, although Ilhéus is experiencing rapid urban and social reform, some of the old ways endure alongside modernization, including arduous toil, exploitation, greed and violence.

[2] The novel has been criticised for its plodding pace and predictable plot, unredeemed by abrupt shifts from narrative past to present tense.

The translation, moreover, is criticised for converting rural Brazilian Portuguese into southern American English idioms with lackluster effects.