The Cuban Club

The Cuban Club PDF Author: Barry Gifford
Publisher: Seven Stories Press
ISBN: 1609807901
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 251

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Book Description
A masterpiece of mood and setting, character and remembrance, The Cuban Club is Barry Gifford's ultimate coming-of-age story told as sixty-four linked tales, a creation myth of The Fall as seen through the eyes of an innocent boy on the cusp of becoming an innocent man. Set in Chicago in the 1950s and early ‘60s against the backdrop of small-time hoodlums in the Chicago mob and the girls and women attached to them, there is the nearness of heinous crimes, and the price to be paid for them. To Roy and his friends, these twists and tragedies drift by like curious flotsam. The tales themselves are koan-like, often ending in questions, with rarely a conclusion. One story, a letter from Roy to his father four years after his father's death, is written as if the older man were still alive. Indeed, throughout The Cuban Club Roy is in some doubt whether divorce or even death really exists in a world where everything seems so alive and connected. Barry Gifford has been writing his Roy stories on and off for over thirty years, and earlier Roy stories have been published in Wyoming, Memories from a Sinking Ship and The Roy Stories. But it is in The Cuban Club that he brings the form he has created in these stories to its crystallization. Indeed, to find precedents for The Cuban Club, we must look not to other story collections, but to other creation myths—to Gilgamesh, or the Old Testament, or Eduardo Galeano's Memory of Fire trilogy. Roy's age here wends back and forth between six and nineteen and back to twelve. He sees with the ageless eyes of a seer and knows not to judge the good or the bad in circumstances or people, or even to question why things are as they are, instead gathering to himself the romance of a world that teeters on catastrophe always, even as it abounds in saving graces.

The Cuban Club

The Cuban Club PDF Author: Barry Gifford
Publisher: Seven Stories Press
ISBN: 1609807901
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 251

Get Book Here

Book Description
A masterpiece of mood and setting, character and remembrance, The Cuban Club is Barry Gifford's ultimate coming-of-age story told as sixty-four linked tales, a creation myth of The Fall as seen through the eyes of an innocent boy on the cusp of becoming an innocent man. Set in Chicago in the 1950s and early ‘60s against the backdrop of small-time hoodlums in the Chicago mob and the girls and women attached to them, there is the nearness of heinous crimes, and the price to be paid for them. To Roy and his friends, these twists and tragedies drift by like curious flotsam. The tales themselves are koan-like, often ending in questions, with rarely a conclusion. One story, a letter from Roy to his father four years after his father's death, is written as if the older man were still alive. Indeed, throughout The Cuban Club Roy is in some doubt whether divorce or even death really exists in a world where everything seems so alive and connected. Barry Gifford has been writing his Roy stories on and off for over thirty years, and earlier Roy stories have been published in Wyoming, Memories from a Sinking Ship and The Roy Stories. But it is in The Cuban Club that he brings the form he has created in these stories to its crystallization. Indeed, to find precedents for The Cuban Club, we must look not to other story collections, but to other creation myths—to Gilgamesh, or the Old Testament, or Eduardo Galeano's Memory of Fire trilogy. Roy's age here wends back and forth between six and nineteen and back to twelve. He sees with the ageless eyes of a seer and knows not to judge the good or the bad in circumstances or people, or even to question why things are as they are, instead gathering to himself the romance of a world that teeters on catastrophe always, even as it abounds in saving graces.

Espectros

Espectros PDF Author: Cheyin Goglas
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781539465560
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 278

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Book Description
The Circulo Cubano de Tampa is a 115 year old social club in Ybor City. The present day membership is small, but dedicated to preserving its heritage and their clubhouse, the majestic four story Cuban Club. True to its origins, the membership is made up of people from different walks of life. A family without blood ties, their individual strengths lent to each other so that they may collectively flourish in life. Frank is the club president who frequently gives tours of the building. A visit by one of the local retirement homes creates an opportunity to meet someone interesting from the building's past. The club treasurer, Duke, was only supposed to open the building for some caterers getting ready for a party. He ends up crossing paths with several of the spectral elements that haunt building. Iris is looking for a way back out of Tampa. The audition of a lifetime presents itself to her. The lure of Hollywood beckons. Will she be able to make the cut or will it be the death of her? As a paramedic, Gus is used to being underappreciated and overworked by the fire department. His faith in his brothers on the Fire Line is strong, but his tolerance for the job is weakening. While repaying a favor, he discovers his best friend's true nature. A near death crisis ends up presenting him an opportunity to realize one of his life's goals. All are tied to the Cuban Club building, which hides secrets of its own. In this mystery, 'Espectros' displays individuals dealing with different elements of the past and how they affect their collective present, culminating in an exciting conclusion. Sprinkled with historic facts and many real life locations in Tampa, this novel will delight locals, history buffs, and mystery lovers alike. A portion of all book profits will be donated to the Cuban Club Foundation Endowment to assist with continual rehabilitation and preservation efforts of the historic clubhouse.

Cuba (Winner of the Pulitzer Prize)

Cuba (Winner of the Pulitzer Prize) PDF Author: Ada Ferrer
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1501154575
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 436

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Book Description
WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE IN HISTORY WINNER OF THE LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK PRIZE IN HISTORY “Full of…lively insights and lucid prose” (The Wall Street Journal) an epic, sweeping history of Cuba and its complex ties to the United States—from before the arrival of Columbus to the present day—written by one of the world’s leading historians of Cuba. In 1961, at the height of the Cold War, the United States severed diplomatic relations with Cuba, where a momentous revolution had taken power three years earlier. For more than half a century, the stand-off continued—through the tenure of ten American presidents and the fifty-year rule of Fidel Castro. His death in 2016, and the retirement of his brother and successor Raúl Castro in 2021, have spurred questions about the country’s future. Meanwhile, politics in Washington—Barack Obama’s opening to the island, Donald Trump’s reversal of that policy, and the election of Joe Biden—have made the relationship between the two nations a subject of debate once more. Now, award-winning historian Ada Ferrer delivers an “important” (The Guardian) and moving chronicle that demands a new reckoning with both the island’s past and its relationship with the United States. Spanning more than five centuries, Cuba: An American History provides us with a front-row seat as we witness the evolution of the modern nation, with its dramatic record of conquest and colonization, of slavery and freedom, of independence and revolutions made and unmade. Along the way, Ferrer explores the sometimes surprising, often troubled intimacy between the two countries, documenting not only the influence of the United States on Cuba but also the many ways the island has been a recurring presence in US affairs. This is a story that will give Americans unexpected insights into the history of their own nation and, in so doing, help them imagine a new relationship with Cuba; “readers will close [this] fascinating book with a sense of hope” (The Economist). Filled with rousing stories and characters, and drawing on more than thirty years of research in Cuba, Spain, and the United States—as well as the author’s own extensive travel to the island over the same period—this is a stunning and monumental account like no other.

Black Pedro Pan

Black Pedro Pan PDF Author: Ricardo Gonzalez Zayas
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 182

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Book Description
The early migration of Cuban refugees to the United States after the ascent to power of the Cuban Revolution in 1959, was made up in disproportionate numbers by white (or lighter skin) Cubans. As part of that migration, Operación Pedro Pan reflected the racial make-up of those seeking to leave the island. In Black Pedro Pan, the author recounts his childhood and major family influences that gave shape to his life. As he entered his teenage years, his life is abruptly interrupted by his participation in Operacion Pedro Pan, a program that saw the mass exodus of over 14,000 unaccompanied Cuban minors ages 6 to 18 to the United States, where the vast majority were received and sheltered by the Catholic Welfare Bureau. He then briefly describes his participation in the program, his personal experiences and observations after his reunification with his exiled parents at age 17. As he continues his life's journey, he offers, through a series of vignettes and anecdotes, his outlook on racial issues in general, his insights into the Cuban exile and African-American communities and the relationship between the two, and, from a distance, his impressions on the state of his native country, all from the perspective of a Black Cuban (or perhaps as appropriate, a Cuban Black).

The Cuban Affair

The Cuban Affair PDF Author: Nelson DeMille
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1501101722
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 448

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Book Description
Mac has left his life of danger and adventure behind him. But when Carlos, a hotshot lawyer heavily involved with anti-Castro groups, approaches Mac for a ten-day fishing tournament in Cuba - to be accompanied by a covert mission and a sizable paycheck - Mac's interest is piqued. Mac understands that if he accepts this job, he'll either walk away rich - or not at all.

Havana Boxing Club

Havana Boxing Club PDF Author:
Publisher: powerHouse Books
ISBN: 9781576877838
Category : Photography
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Boxing is one of the most popular sports in Cuba and its fighters are recognized the world over for their skills and finesse. The Cuban national team holds more Olympic medals in the sport than any other country, making the nation a hotbed of emerging global champions. State-sanctioned and promoted since the revolution, amateur boxing's potential for fame and relative wealth makes it a beacon for impoverished youth yearning for a better life. Shot all across the Republic of Cuba,Havana Boxing Clubdocuments amateur boxing schools and the aspiring, determined boys studying the sweet science. Compiled over the course of eight years, French photographer Thierry Le Goues spent countless hours in the complex network of training facilities that abound in the island nation, developing relationships with the coaches and their young progeny, following the rise and fall of countless talents and wannabes. The resulting images are of young fighters struggling, sweating, and fighting to overcome anything thrown in their way--inside the ring and out. Le Goues' luscious tritone black and white photographs depict rigorous training camps, boxing rings erected in the streets of small villages in the Cuban countryside, the lows of these young boxers struggling with abject poverty and crushing defeat, and the ultimate highs of rising up victorious over all obstacles and challengers. The pure instinct to survive against overwhelming odds and to realize their dreams of boxing on the national team is both startling and beautiful.Havana Boxing Clubcaptures the sport's arresting beauty and unrelenting brutality.

Letters from Cuba

Letters from Cuba PDF Author: Ruth Behar
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 0525516492
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 290

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Book Description
Pura Belpré Award Winner Ruth Behar's inspiring story of a Jewish girl who escapes Poland to make a new life in Cuba, where she works to rescue the rest of her family The situation is getting dire for Jews in Poland on the eve of World War II. Esther's father has fled to Cuba, and she is the first one to join him. It's heartbreaking to be separated from her beloved sister, so Esther promises to write down everything that happens until they're reunited. And she does, recording both the good--the kindness of the Cuban people and her discovery of a valuable hidden talent--and the bad: the fact that Nazism has found a foothold even in Cuba. Esther's evocative letters are full of her appreciation for life and reveal a resourceful, determined girl with a rare ability to bring people together, all the while striving to get the rest of their family out of Poland before it's too late. Based on Ruth Behar's family history, this compelling story celebrates the resilience of the human spirit in the most challenging times.

Miami’s Forgotten Cubans

Miami’s Forgotten Cubans PDF Author: Alan A. Aja
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137570458
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 265

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Book Description
This book explores the reception experiences of post-1958 Afro-Cubans in South Florida in relation to their similarly situated “white” Cuban compatriots. Utilizing interviews, ethnographic observations, and applying Census data analyses, Aja begins not with the more socially diverse 1980 Mariel boatlift, but earlier, documenting that a small number of middle-class Afro-Cuban exiles defied predominant settlement patterns in the 1960 and 70s, attempting to immerse themselves in the newly formed but ultimately racially exclusive “ethnic enclave.” Confronting a local Miami Cuban “white wall” and anti-black Southern racism subsumed within an intra-group “success” myth that equally holds Cubans and other Latin Americans hail from “racial democracies,” black Cubans immigrants and their children, including subsequent waves of arrival and return-migrants, found themselves negotiating the boundaries of being both “black” and “Latino” in the United States.

Buena Vista in the Club

Buena Vista in the Club PDF Author: Geoffrey Baker
Publisher: Duke University Press
ISBN: 0822349590
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 426

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Book Description
Geoffrey Baker traces the trajectory of the Havana hip hop scene from the late 1980s to the present and analyzes its partial eclipse by reggaet&ón.

The Roy Stories

The Roy Stories PDF Author: Barry Gifford
Publisher: Seven Stories Press
ISBN: 1609804988
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 433

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Book Description
Barry Gifford has been writing gritty, American tales for the past forty years. His novels, stories, poetry, and films have helped shape the American neo-noir genre. The New York Times Book Review says that he "can sum up in a few words the cruelty, horror, and crushing banality that shape an entire life.” Andrei Codrescu calls Gifford “a great comic realist,” while Pedro Almodóvar likens him to the surrealist filmmaker Luis Buñuel, and Jonathan Lethem describes his style as “William Faulkner by way of B-movie film noir, porn paperbacks, and Sun Records rockabilly.” In The Roy Stories Gifford brings his signature style to a collection of tales following the character of Roy, who has made appearances in a number of Gifford’s previous story collections. Roy lives a mystical kind of life, skinning crocodiles in Southern Florida at age nine in the 1940s and playing in the back alleys of Chicago in the 1950s. This deep-feeling boy observes every detail in his surroundings with a sense of dark humor and an openness that will clutch readers tightly by the heart and lead them on a historical journey.