Spared Angola: Memories from a Cuban-American Childhood

Book excerpt: pared Angola: Memories from a Cuban American Childhood is a powerful and original first collection of autobiographical stories, essays and poems. The successful novelist here lays bare the makings of his conscience as a writer and human being, detailing the psychological pressure of male expectations, family gender battles, emigration and adjusting to a new culture. Hoping to spare their only child the fate of thousands of young Cubans conscripted to fight in the revolution in Angola, Su‡rezÕs parents left Cuba, unaware of the sentence destiny would impose instead. Su‡rezÕs compelling piece invokes the agony and frustration borne of growing up in terminal exile and cultural limbo. From anguish and turmoil, the artist has wrought one of the most eloquent and commanding voices of contemporary American literature.