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Overview
"Latin Jazz blends Anglo and Hispanic tempos as it chronicles a Cuban emigre family's hopes and sorrows in making a new home in Los Angeles. Men from three generations alternate in telling their family story, which culminates in the dramatic refugee boat lift from Mariel Harbor, Cuba, to Miami in 1980: Hugo, a political prisoner still trying to escape Cuba for America; his father, Esteban, settled almost twenty years in California but longing to return his wife's ashes to their homeland; Angel, Esteban's son-in-law, who dreams of bigger things than the ice-cream truck concession he operates in L.A.; and Angel's son, Diego, who soothes a vague sense of unrootedness with cocaine, sex, and alcohol." Exuding both bravura and pensiveness, Latin Jazz speaks insistently and clearly to the Cuban-American exile experience.Editorials
Publishers Weekly -
In his first novel, Cuban emigre Suarez weaves together the contentious, disparate voices of a three-generation Cuban-American family in 1980. Esteban, the patriarch, has resettled most of the clan in California, where he lives out his days ogling young women but longs to return the ashes of his late wife to their homeland. Esteban's daughter Lilian operates an ice-cream truck concession with her husband Angel, who dreams of slightly bigger things; their son Diego leads a band at a local club and mourns the departure of his duplicitous wife Vanessa. Their narratives alternate with the story of Esteban's son Hugo, a Cuban political prisoner desperate to escape in the mass deportations from Mariel Harbor to Miami. In Suarez's overly schematic tale, the women are given unnecessarily short shrift, and his overreliance on stylistic flourishesthe novel is written in the first, second and third personsoccasionally overwhelms this sensitive, vividly detailed family album. (Mar.)Library Journal
Key West emerges as the Cuban Ellis Island in this first novel, which portrays a Los Angeles family during the April 1980 Mariel boat lift. As the title suggests, Latin and Anglo concerns and styles blend. In the tradition of Dos Passos and Fuentes, the story switches among first, second, and third person narrators. The exodus, as told by Hugo--a former guerrilla still trying to escape from prison to America--is chronicled in vivid, fresh writing. Young Diego's tale also succeeds, although as a second tour of a cocaine-infested night club and a failed marriage, it is a bit too much like Jay McInerney's Bright Lights, Big City (LJ 10/1/84). Unfortunately, other sections are flat and miss too many opportunities, as when Diego and his grandfather take a cross-country van ride and nothing happens on the way.-- Ethan Bumas, Hongzhou Inst., Zhejiang, ChinaBook Details
Published
March 1, 2002
Publisher
Baton Rouge : Louisiana State University Press, 2002.
Pages
304
Format
Paperback
ISBN
9780807127902