PDF Waiting for Snow in Havana Confessions of a Cuban Boy Carlos Eire 9780743246415 Books
Download As PDF : Waiting for Snow in Havana Confessions of a Cuban Boy Carlos Eire 9780743246415 Books
“Have mercy on me, Lord, I am Cuban.” In 1962, Carlos Eire was one of 14,000 children airlifted out of Havana—exiled from his family, his country, and his own childhood by Fidel Castro’s revolution. Winner of the National Book Award, this stunning memoir is a vibrant and evocative look at Latin America from a child’s unforgettable experience.
Waiting for Snow in Havana is both an exorcism and an ode to a paradise lost. For the Cuba of Carlos’s youth—with its lizards and turquoise seas and sun-drenched siestas—becomes an island of condemnation once a cigar-smoking guerrilla named Fidel Castro ousts President Batista on January 1, 1959. Suddenly the music in the streets sounds like gunfire. Christmas is made illegal, political dissent leads to imprisonment, and too many of Carlos’s friends are leaving Cuba for a place as far away and unthinkable as the United States. Carlos will end up there, too, and fulfill his mother’s dreams by becoming a modern American man—even if his soul remains in the country he left behind.
Narrated with the urgency of a confession, Waiting for Snow in Havana is a eulogy for a native land and a loving testament to the collective spirit of Cubans everywhere.
PDF Waiting for Snow in Havana Confessions of a Cuban Boy Carlos Eire 9780743246415 Books
"I loved this book. Easy reading, funny at times and sad. Being Latinamerican myself, but not Cuban, the book gives me a broader, clearer picture of what life was like during those dark days of the Cuban revolution and the atrocities in the beginning of Fidel's regime, especially from a young boy's honest perspective. Through the decades, I have occasionally wondered about the fate of those 14,000+ children of Operation Pedro Pan. I am eager to know Mr. Eire's journey in the USA from orphan to professor at a distinguished university. I highly recommend this book to all Americans to become informed about a time, a generation and an Operation most of us know so little about. Also, to Latinamerican immigrants, like me, who will identify with so many of the culture's common denominator idiosyncrasies, practices, superstitions, expressions, family life, etc., which bind us together and don't change among the LA countries. Get yourself a copy."
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Waiting for Snow in Havana Confessions of a Cuban Boy Carlos Eire 9780743246415 Books Reviews :
Waiting for Snow in Havana Confessions of a Cuban Boy Carlos Eire 9780743246415 Books Reviews
- I found this book to be especially interesting because I am the same age as the author. While he was growing up in a struggling Cuba I was being raised in sunny suburban Southern California, where life seemed free of major conflict. (As I matured, of course I became aware that racial conflict and overt racism were abundant throughout L.A. County.) After reading this book I have a much better understanding of the Cuban conflict. In my early teens I had been aware of the revolution but brushed it off as occurring too far away and not of my concern.
I gave only four stars because I believe the book should have been edited. There was too much discussion of boyhood pranks. I got to the point of skipping over those parts. While I appreciate that the author included those shenanigans in an effort to show how typical his boyhood had been prior to the revolution, I believe they were included to excess. Also, it would have been helpful if the author had included a chart of names to refer to because the cast of family and friends was large and at times confusing.
Read this book if you want to become enlightened about the Cuban conflict from a deeply personal perspective. - I loved this book. Easy reading, funny at times and sad. Being Latinamerican myself, but not Cuban, the book gives me a broader, clearer picture of what life was like during those dark days of the Cuban revolution and the atrocities in the beginning of Fidel's regime, especially from a young boy's honest perspective. Through the decades, I have occasionally wondered about the fate of those 14,000+ children of Operation Pedro Pan. I am eager to know Mr. Eire's journey in the USA from orphan to professor at a distinguished university. I highly recommend this book to all Americans to become informed about a time, a generation and an Operation most of us know so little about. Also, to Latinamerican immigrants, like me, who will identify with so many of the culture's common denominator idiosyncrasies, practices, superstitions, expressions, family life, etc., which bind us together and don't change among the LA countries. Get yourself a copy.
- Excellent memoir of a Cuban boy separated from his parents to escape communist Cuba during the violent horrors of the socialist revolution. Very much appreciated the inside historical view of Cuba both before and after the revolution. Socialism destroyed the freedom, beauty, and culture of Cuba. Lived in Miami at the time and remember the influx of Cuban refugees. How I wish I could relive that time with this knowledge for I would have been much more compassionate towards these displaced, very peaceful, hard working, highly intelligent people who have contributed immeasurably to our own culture and prosperity. No food stamps or welfare back then, but they made it by very hard work and determination.
- I just came back from Cuba and I think having been there I understand Mr. Eire's novel much better than those who have never gone. It is a well written novel, although it occasionally dives into random (or what seemed random to me) thoughts triggered by his personal responses to life events which sometimes don't seem to have much to do with his experience as a Cuban. Cuba is lovely and terrifyingly ugly at the same time. The people are much more open that I had thought, but they hold on to many beliefs inculcated in them by the revolutionary rhetoric, having not been much exposed to other ways of thinking for the last 50 years. The suffering is on two levels the older generation who lost everything, including their homes, businesses, families and homeland, and the younger generation who struggle to put food on the table and find adequate housing every day. On top of this is religion, which Mr. Eire explores well in his novel.
- Suggested to me by one of my best friend's mothers, who was also a Peter Pan child. I wanted to understand her story more and she said this book will be the closest to it until she can sit down with me and tell me herself. Blown away. In so many ways. His writing, so beautiful. His ability to take me to where he was, amazing. His story, heartbreaking and incredible. I had an idea about what happened in Cuba, but realize now I knew so little. This book is now one of my very favorites. I have so much more empathy now for the people of Cuba and for those who fled here, to the USA. Thank you for sharing this with the world.
- Became a lot better than I thought it was going to be after the first fifth of the story. Cuban middle class spoiled brats, "ninos bitongos" as the author later calls himself and friends, who, oddly, never see Cuba beyond Havana, and rarely Havana outside of its better precints in the waning years of Batista thugs (mostly), and the early years of Castro thugs. A bivisioned memoir, with snaps forward to brief cuts at various places and situations in the US, to which his parents send him in 1962, but the US is very secondary to Cuba-shaped clouds, emerald sea, multi-colored fish, lizards beyond number, family relations, dozens of Jesus forms, emotion and embraces and corresponding dislike of the Kant's cold rationalism, and 7 proofs for the existence of God. Worth your time.
- I so enjoyed this wonderful book in part because, like Carlos, I grew up in an environment with little supervision and more freedom as a pre-teen that most people get in a lifetime. Carlos grew up in Havana and I grew up on an air force base in Canada. The base bordered swamps and woods; in the summer we boys disappeared early in the morning and always returned late for supper. What went on during the day would have scared our parents into locking us up forever had they known. We were not allowed to go swimming for at least an hour after a meal but were unwittingly permitted to build boats armed with gunpowder filled cannons and brave violent spring rivers in old zinc tubs. Carlos lived through sanctioned rock fights and wild surf. But Carlos, at a very tender age, was forced out of his country by Fidel and obviously managed to cope, survive, grow up and write beautifully.
