Havana Libre

October 1, 2017
At the behest of Castro's government, a Cuban doctor is sent to Miami in 1997 to find out who has been sponsoring a series of terrorist bombings in Havana in this new novel by Arellano (Havana Lunar, 2009, etc.)Dr. Mano Rodriguez finds himself in the aftermath of a hotel bombing, unable to save a victim bleeding to death before him. Soon afterward, he accepts a proposition that he travel to Miami to uncover information about the man behind the bombings--an ardent anti-communist out to avenge himself on Castro's revolution--and what the next targets might be. Mano's trip is complicated by the fact that his conduit to the man is the father he has never met. Meanwhile, Mano is trying to provide a base of stability for a pregnant country girl who has come to the city and whom he doesn't want to see wind up as just one more of Havana's desperate poor. The mechanics of the plot often take a back seat to the detailing of the deprivation of life under Castro: the blackouts, the goods that are sparse and, when available, shoddy, the sense of never having had enough to eat. All this detail is not extrinsic to the story, but there are times when it gets in the way of its momentum. It takes almost half the book for Mano to get to Miami, and the climax, cutting between three different locations as the seconds to another hotel bombing tick away, is both undeniably tense and a bit rushed.This novel is rich in atmosphere and political critique; if only they had been more seamlessly woven into the meat of the story.

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October 16, 2017
Billed as a standalone sequel to Edgar-finalist Arellano’s Havana Lunar, this potent noir sheds light on Cuban life in the post-Soviet era. In 1997, a series of terrorist bombings have put the people of Havana on edge. The attacks, focused on densely populated tourist areas, seem aimed at crippling the communist power structure. When Mano Rodriguez, a talented pediatrician in Cuba’s national medical service, is invited to attend a medical seminar in Miami, he puts in a request for an exit permit, which attracts the attention of Col. Emilio Pérez of the revolutionary police force. Pérez offers to expedite the paperwork if Rodriguez agrees to help them with a special undercover mission to infiltrate the exiled Cubans in Miami believed to be responsible for the bombings, to help thwart future attacks. Rodriguez’s assignment is to fake his own defection, and his contact in Miami is none other than the father who abandoned him and his mother nearly three decades ago. Building to an explosive ending, this atmospheric mix of proletarian literature and Graham Greene–style espionage informs as it entertains.

Starred review from October 15, 2017
Dr. Mano Rodriguez, the narrator of most of this exquisitely made thriller (a sequel to Havana Lunar, 2009) operates a clinic for the poor in Havana. He's nearly as impoverished as his patients, but that doesn't slow him. He's happy functioning in a society both romantic and thoroughly Cuban, where a woman can boast she's been such a good wife for 60 years her husband hasn't had to hit her once. Dr. Rodriguez is close by when an explosion savages a tourist hotel; he tries to comfort a victim as the unlucky man dies. Shortly thereafter, he's recruited for a spy mission to Miami to learn the further plans of the anti-Castro cell behind the bombing. One of the masterminds is Mano's father, who deserted the family more than 20 years ago. What follows is a remarkably powerful narrative. The interrogation scene repulses while it grips. The foreignness of the setting and dialogue can be trying, but readers are advised to stay with the novel for a rich reading experience.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)