10 books about Cuba

A GOOD MORNING AMERICA BOOK CLUB PICK A sweeping, masterful debut about a daughter's fateful choice, a mother motivated by her own past, and a family legacy that begins in Cuba before either of them were born In present-day Miami, Jeanette is battling addiction. Daughter of Carmen, a Cuban immigrant, she is determined to learn more about her family history from her reticent mother and makes the snap decision to take in the daughter of a neighbor detained by ICE. Carmen, still wrestling with the trauma of displacement, must process her difficult relationship with her own mother while trying to raise a wayward Jeanette. Steadfast in her quest for understanding, Jeanette travels to Cuba to see her grandmother and reckon with secrets from the past destined to erupt. From 19th-century cigar factories to present-day detention centers, from Cuba to Mexico, Gabriela Garcia's Of Women and Salt is a kaleidoscopic portrait of betrayals—personal and political, self-inflicted and those done by others—that have shaped the lives of these extraordinary women. A haunting meditation on the choices of mothers, the legacy of the memories they carry, and the tenacity of women who choose to tell their stories despite those who wish to silence them, this is more than a diaspora story; it is a story of America’s most tangled, honest, human roots.

A HELLO SUNSHINE x REESE WITHERSPOON BOOK CLUB PICK "A beautiful novel that's full of forbidden passions, family secrets and a lot of courage and sacrifice."--Reese Witherspoon After the death of her beloved grandmother, a Cuban-American woman travels to Havana, where she discovers the roots of her identity--and unearths a family secret hidden since the revolution... Havana, 1958. The daughter of a sugar baron, nineteen-year-old Elisa Perez is part of Cuba's high society, where she is largely sheltered from the country's growing political unrest--until she embarks on a clandestine affair with a passionate revolutionary... Miami, 2017. Freelance writer Marisol Ferrera grew up hearing romantic stories of Cuba from her late grandmother Elisa, who was forced to flee with her family during the revolution. Elisa's last wish was for Marisol to scatter her ashes in the country of her birth. Arriving in Havana, Marisol comes face-to-face with the contrast of Cuba's tropical, timeless beauty and its perilous political climate. When more family history comes to light and Marisol finds herself attracted to a man with secrets of his own, she'll need the lessons of her grandmother's past to help her understand the true meaning of courage.

Doctor Luis Barreras, nicknamed "Wichi," encounters brutality following Batista's 1952 coup. While practicing hematology and raising three children in suburban Havana, he attempts to shield them from growing political unrest and violence that culminate in a Revolution with Fidel Castro seizing power in 1959. Religious persecution, loss of freedom, senseless killings, and government takeover of his medical practice make matters intolerable for Barreras. "If Batista was a canker sore, Fidel is the plague." How will he and his family endure the affliction?KILLING MY CUBA is a historical fiction novel that features the life and customs of the middle-class Barreras family, their relatives, and friends during 1949-1961. An undertone of the story is the foreboding prediction of Cuba's future Wichi hears early in the book, and it continues to prey on his mind. As his medical practice dwindles, his personal involvement in the horrific consequences of the Cuban Revolution increases.

"[DePalma] renders a Cuba few tourists will ever see . . . You won't forget these people soon, and you are bound to emerge from DePalma's bighearted account with a deeper understanding of a storied island . . . A remarkably revealing glimpse into the world of a muzzled yet irrepressibly ebullient neighbor."--The New York Times Modern Cuba comes alive in a vibrant portrait of a group of families's varied journeys in one community over the last twenty years. Cubans today, most of whom have lived their entire lives under the Castro regime, are hesitantly embracing the future. In his new book, Anthony DePalma, a veteran reporter with years of experience in Cuba, focuses on a neighborhood across the harbor from Old Havana to dramatize the optimism as well as the enormous challenges that Cubans face: a moving snapshot of Cuba with all its contradictions as the new regime opens the gate to the capitalism that Fidel railed against for so long. In Guanabacoa, longtime residents prove enterprising in the extreme. Scrounging materials in the black market, Cary Luisa Limonta Ewen has started her own small manufacturing business, a surprising turn for a former ranking member of the Communist Party. Her good friend Lili, a loyal Communist, heads the neighborhood's watchdog revolutionary committee. Artist Arturo Montoto, who had long lived and worked in Mexico, moved back to Cuba when he saw improving conditions but complains like any artist about recognition. In stark contrast, Jorge García lives in Miami and continues to seek justice for the sinking of a tugboat full of refugees, a tragedy that claimed the lives of his son, grandson, and twelve other family members, a massacre for which the government denies any role. In The Cubans, many patriots face one new question: is their loyalty to the revolution, or to their country? As people try to navigate their new reality, Cuba has become an improvised country, an old machine kept running with equal measures of ingenuity and desperation. A new kind of revolutionary spirit thrives beneath the conformity of a half century of totalitarian rule. And over all of this looms the United States, with its unpredictable policies, which warmed towards its neighbor under one administration but whose policies have now taken on a chill reminiscent of the Cold War.

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Vivien Goodman Malloy's life as a "long shot" began years before her life as a horsewoman and horse breeder-in fact, her long-shot die was cast before she was born. It begins in 1909, in Spain, with the surprise birth of her mother, an unexpected and premature twin of a baby brother who doesn't live. Maria Consuelo Candida Francisca Catarina de Siena Robato y Mañach­­- "Nena"-does. She grows up in Cuba, falls in love, and marries Rafaele "Lello" Matacena, learning she is pregnant while he is back in Naples tending to his disapproving Italian family. Lello never returns. Nena gives birth to Vivien and three years later marries Andrew Goodman, heir to the Bergdorf Goodman department store. Little Vivien Matacena becomes Vivien Goodman, trading her abuelita's home in Havana for a penthouse above the family store in Manhattan. A Cinderella story of sorts, but life is more complicated, and this is just the start of twists and turns, triumphs and tragedies that make up Vivien Goodman Malloy's My Life as a Long Shot: From Cuba to Rye.

Since the first edition of Cuba Thenwas published in 2014, there have been several seismic shifts- President Obama moved to normalize relations, a US embassy was opened, Fidel Castro died, and the current administration announced plans to freeze relations again. This intensified interest in Cuba has seen record numbers of Americans traveling there. It is only fitting to release a revised and expanded edition of Cuba Thento satisfy the demand for this growing interest in the country's history and visual culture. With fifty newly selected vintage photographs and pieces of ephemera from the collection of Ramiro FernBndez, the most extensive archive of Cuban photography outside of the island nation, Cuba Thenis a tribute to the lost eras of style, glamor, ebullience, intrigue, and upheaval. The more than 300 images here span the entire spectrum of photographic history, including rare daguerreotypes, ambrotypes, cartes-de-visite, and stereograms. A rich spectrum of personalities spanning more than a century appear- aristocratic race-car drivers, movie stars and showgirls, gangsters, spies, and everyday folk. Much of FernBndez's collection is little seen and never published, including unique prints of Castro riding on a public bus, a chess-playing Che Guevara, and Heinz L3ning, the Nazi spy who inspired Graham Greene's Our Man in Havana. Featuring a foreword by poet Richard Blanco, Cuba Thenis a welcome new edition of this seductive photographic survey of the small island that continues to fascinate the world.

No synopsis available at the moment.

The Cuban Revolution took everything from Beatriz Perez. Recruited by the CIA to infiltrate Fidel Castro's inner circle and pulled into the dangerous world of espionage, Beatriz is consumed by her quest for revenge. As the Cold War swells over the Florida Strait, Beatriz is caught between the clash of Cuban-American politics and the perils of a forbidden affair with a powerful man. When tides of history threaten everything she has fought for, she must make a choice between her past and future, and the wrong move could cost Beatriz everything - including the man who has stolen her heart.

Although separated by continents and decades, Josef, a Jewish boy livng in 1930s Nazi Germany; Isabel, a Cuban girl trying to escape the riots and unrest plaguing her country in 1994; and Mahmoud, a Syrian boy in 2015 whose homeland is torn apart by violence and destruction, embark on harrowing journeys in search of refuge, discovering shocking connections that tie their stories together.