Title: Next Year in Havana
Author: Chanel Cleeton
Release date: February 6, 2018
Genre: Women’s Fiction/Historical Fiction
Publisher: Penguin/Berkley
Book Summary:
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.
Book Links:
Amazon: http://amzn.to/2pdQBKF
Barnes & Noble: http://bit.ly/2pYsJJY
iBooks: http://apple.co/2pvYffq
IndieBound: http://bit.ly/2zrt11m
Kobo: http://bit.ly/2wPZPMU
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/34374628-next-year-in-havana
Learn more about Next Year in Havana including downloading the book club guide and more Here
Add Beatriz Perez’s story WHEN WE LEFT CUBA on Goodreads here.
Praise for Next Year in Havana:
Chanel Cleeton's Next Year In Havana is a flat-out stunner of a book, at once a dual-timeline mystery, a passionate romance, and paean to the tragedy and beauty of war-torn Cuba. The story of sugar heiress Elisa, watching Cuba fall into revolution as Castro rises, is intertwined with the modern-day tale of Elisa's granddaughter Marisol as she returns to Cuba after Castro's death. Both women fall for fire-brand revolutionaries, but Cuba itself emerges as their true love-interest, threatening to break both women's hearts as Elisa and Marisol each grapple in their own way with what it is to be Cuban, what it is to be an exile, and how to love and live in a homeland riven by revolution. Simply wonderful!
- Kate Quinn, New York Times bestselling author of The Alice Network
Cleeton has penned an atmospheric, politically insightful, and highly hopeful homage to a lost world. Devour NEXT YEAR IN HAVANA and you, too, will smell the perfumed groves, taste the ropa vieja, and feel the sun on your face. Just a wonderful and educational book!
- Stephanie Dray, New York Times bestselling author of America's First Daughter
A vivid, transporting novel. Next Year in Havana is about journeys-- into exile, into history, and into questions of home and identity. It's an engrossing read.
- David Ebershoff, author of The Danish Girl and The 19th Wife
An evocative, passionate story of family loyalty and forbidden love that moves seamlessly between the past and present of Cuba’s turbulent history— how one young woman’s sacrifice becomes the key to her granddaughter’s future—how culture and spirit survive against all odds. Next Year in Havana kept me enthralled and savoring every word.
- Shelley Noble, New York Times bestselling author of Whisper Beach
In Next Year in Havana, Chanel Cleeton's prose is as beautiful as Cuba itself, and the story she weaves--of exile and loss, memory and myth, forbidden love and enduring friendship--is at once sweeping and beautifully intimate. This is a moving, heartfelt, and gorgeously realized story that will stay with you long after you turn the final page.
- Jennifer Robson, USA Today bestselling author of Somewhere in France
Author Information:
Originally from Florida, Chanel Cleeton grew up on stories of her family's exodus from Cuba following the events of the Cuban Revolution. Her passion for politics and history continued during her years spent studying in England where she earned a bachelor's degree in International Relations from Richmond, The American International University in London and a master's degree in Global Politics from the London School of Economics & Political Science. Chanel also received her Juris Doctor from the University of South Carolina School of Law. She loves to travel and has lived in the Caribbean, Europe, and Asia.
Author Links:
Website: www.chanelcleeton.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/authorchanelcleeton
Facebook Reader Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1545366192398558/
Twitter: www.twitter.com/chanelcleeton
Goodreads: www.goodreads.com/chanelcleeton
Newsletter: www.chanelcleeton.com/mailing-list/
Instagram: www.instagram.com/chanelcleeton/
Review
Rating: 4 stars
Governments change, regimes fall, alliances shift— with so much that lies out of our hands, it seems like love is the easiest and only thing worth trusting.
Next Year in Havana is a book that explores the Cuban heritage and history with acute detail and the deepest love. If there was one truth I could share about this story, it would be that Cleeton has created something meaningful, a book that has authenticity and heart permeating every single word. You cannot read this book and not examine your own life and the blessing of freedom that you have been given. The Cuban people have endured intense suffering, injustice, and fear with pragmatic determination to overcome every obstacle. All with the hope that there will someday be a better tomorrow, a chance to finally be free and undivided.
There are two alternating timelines, the first takes place in 1958/1959 during tumultuous revolutionary Cuba, centering around nineteen-year-old Elisa Perez and her family. Each side of the story had a purpose and a destination, cautiously and carefully unfolding truths and heartbreaks in order to bring you full circle in the end. Personally I feel as if I was more invested in Elisa's timeline: her unexpected forbidden love as the violent rebellion broke out all around her. Her family members were all fascinating in their own right, most especially Beatrix who is destined for greatness. She had such courage, charisma, and fiery passion that she stole the scene throughout the entire book.
Elisa was such a brave and kind woman, and it was a treat to read from her perspective. Not just getting to know her as a person, but discovering what it was like to live through such turmoil and uncertainty was an eye opening experience. Elisa grew up in a pampered lifestyle, a pretty bird in a gilded cage. That veneer of safety was bought and paid for by her father by siding with a dictator, a sacrifice he was willing to make in order for them to have a semblance of a comfortable life. This life they had grown accustomed to was far from stable, and they were going to have to redefine survival when their country is completely torn apart.
The whole time we were pretending our way of life was fine, the “paradise” we’d created was really a fragile deal with a mercurial devil, and the ground beneath us shifted and cracked, destroying the world as we knew it.
I admired Elisa for finding the courage to form her own opinions and discover more than what was inside her sheltered, structured world. Her love affair with Pablo was reckless, but showed her loving and open heart. She wanted to see the best in everyone, she became a champion for this man who fought for everything her family stood against. She was torn by a deeply entrenched family loyalty and the idealism for reform that Pablo had introduced her to.
He is here. I love him. There's nothing else.
From the very beginning, we know that the Perez family will eventually flee Havana and start a new life in the United States. They may have been forced into exile from their homeland, but the hearts, minds and spirits will never let go of the precious memories they hold of the years before they lost everything. Family heirlooms were buried and hidden away, their dreams of returning one day were the only thing they could cling to. A large part of the book explores the dichotomy between the exiles, and those who stayed and gambled on the regime.
Both sides love Cuba, they just do it in different ways. Some love it so much they can’t leave; others love it so much, they cannot stay.”
In the second timeline we meet Elisa's granddaughter Marisol, who is tasked with bringing her grandmother's ashes back home to their final resting place. There, she meets her grandmother's best friend Ana, and her grandson Luis. Acting as her tour guide as she researches for an article she's writing, an instant attraction sparks that quickly burns out of control. During her trip to Havana, she must reconcile the stories she was told of her family's home to the desperation and poverty that the regime has wrought. She struggles to find her place in everything, and her identity when she feels as if everything she knew about her grandmother is nothing at all. Her family has secrets that when uncovered will rock her entire foundation.
Even though we share the same heritage, as hard as I search for commonalities between us, as much as I want to belong here, the differences are glaring. I am Cuban, and yet, I am not. I don’t know where I fit here, in the land of my grandparents, attempting to recreate a Cuba that no longer exists in reality.
The speed with which Marisol fell head over heels for Luis wasn't entirely working for me, being only a matter of a few days. But I was invested all the same, and curious to see if the romantic parallel would continue on until the end, or if the would forge a path of hope with each other somehow. Additionally, I felt as if it took me a long time to wade through the political history and that slowed down my reading experience considerably. At times I felt as if the history on the government became repetitive, and bogged down the pace unnecessarily. Did I still adore the strong female protagonists, the rich setting, and the greater understanding I developed for this country? Unequivocally, yes!
With the short teaser at the end of the book for Beatiriz's story, it made me even more eager to continue on with the series to see her fully fleshed out and in the spotlight where she belongs.
When We Left Cuba will have a release date in 2019 TBA.
FOLLOW SMOKIN HOT BOOK BLOG ON:
0 komentarze:
Post a Comment