THE CUBAN MILE

by Alejandro "Hern‡ndez D'az ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 1, 1998

Hern‡ndez D'az's skimpy first novel won the 1996 National Young Cuban Writers award. It can't have been a good year, for this static tale of two fugitives from Cuba--a bookish artist and his sister's machismo-burdened boyfriend, on a stolen raft drifting toward the Florida coast--is little more than a vehicle for the libertarian political and aesthetic fulminations of the former (who, God help us, narrates) Fortunately, this talkathon, which might have been called Kiss of the Spider Woman at sea (in more senses than one), is brief, and is punctuated by the semiliterate ""Angel's"" forthright boorishness (""happiness is just pussy with beer""). All the same, this chronicle of seven days afloat feels more like seven years' incarceration in a stuffy, ill-stocked library.

Pub Date: May 1, 1998

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: 120

Publisher: Latin American Literary Review

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1998

Categories: FICTION