Pig's Foot

October 21, 2013
Acclaimed Cuban-born dancer Acosta’s debut novel, following his memoir No Way Home, imaginatively records the history of one small, mythical town and its colorful inhabitants, evoking Gabriel García Márquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude. The novel is narrated by Oscar Mandinga, who was born in a hamlet found on no map, “a place called Pig’s Foot–Pata de Puerco.” He tells of the town’s founding by two friends, his great-grandfather Oscar and Jose, who rise out of slavery together. They marry sisters Malena and Betina, respectively, beginning the unraveling thread of ancestry which provides the novel with its stories; of moms who die in childbirth and dads who commit suicide in solidarity; sons raised by false fathers; and brothers falling in love with sisters. Along the way, the narrator’s father, Malecio, a precociously gifted architect as a young man, travels the world and invents the Art Deco style. When the story winds its way back to the present, it turns in on itself, and suggests that after the magic must follow the realism. Not simply a fable, yet unfettered by facts, Acosta’s novel affirms with engaging force that truth lies in storytelling. Agent: Felicity Bryan, Felicity Bryan Associates.

October 15, 2013
Ballet star Acosta's debut novel follows a Cuban family from slavery days to modern Havana. Pata de Puerco (Pig's Foot) is the name of the tiny village founded by friends Oscar and Jose, fresh from their victory in a slave revolt. Oscar, whose origins are a pygmy tribe, the Korticos, and Jose, a Mandinga, forge a bond despite tribal rivalry, marry and start families. Unfortunately, Oscar is soon beset by tragedy--his wife Malena dies giving birth to son Benicio, and Oscar kills himself. Benicio is raised by Jose and his wife, Betina, alongside their son Melecio and daughter Geru. Melecio, a gifted poet, is taken into the household of rum baron Emilio Bacardi to be educated. As Benicio grows, he resembles Oscar less and less, mostly since he is much larger in stature. In fact, he resembles, in size and temperament, the village outcast, an ornery giant known as El Mozambique. Thereby hangs a tale, of course. The return of Melecio and Benicio's attraction to his "sister" Geru cause further complications, and eventually, Benicio and Geru depart for Havana. Here, the feisty narrator, Oscar Mandinga, a descendant of Benicio and Geru, whom he refers to, inaccurately it emerges, as his grandparents, takes over the story. Under suspicion for his political cynicism, Oscar undergoes interrogation at the hands of "whiteshirts" (the Cuban Ku Klux Klan) and embodies the contrast between the apathy and disillusion of young Cubans today and the revolutionary zeal of elders like Benicio and Geru, who witnessed and welcomed the advent of Castro. The shift in tone between the idyll of Pata de Puerco, with its storytellers, wise women, magic amulets and rustic whimsy, and the realities of dystopian Havana are almost too jarring for this relatively short book to encompass. Other than latter-day Oscar, who narrates what is essentially a frame story, no clear protagonist emerges to lend direction to this episodic rags-to-riches-to rags tale. The pyrotechnics of Acosta's writing would benefit from a more tightly choreographed structure.

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November 15, 2013
Internationally acclaimed ballet dancer Acosta has encapsulated more than 100 years in the history of his native Cuba into a grandly entertaining debut novel. In 1995, while being interrogated for reasons not yet revealed, Oscar Mandinga spins a colorful yarn about his ancestors and the rustic backwater village they called home: Pata de Puerco, or Pig's Foot in English. It begins with his great-grandfather and namesake, a pygmy of African heritage. He and his best friend, Jos', marry sisters, and their lives, and those of others they meet, play out against Cuba's troubled political backdrop, from violent slave uprisings on a sugar plantation to the Spanish-American War to the Communist revolution and afterward. The younger Oscar's tone is rough and sarcastic, and the tales he tells are often exaggerated, but underneath all the bluster are several tender stories of love and family and the gradual unfolding of his heartfelt search for identity. Pata de Puerco may exist solely within Acosta's rich imagination, but its unique characters and their exploits will long resonate in readers' minds.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2013, American Library Association.)