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Title: A Harrowing Tale
Review: WOW!Horrific, Bawdy, Informative and Engrosing!Arena's memoir certainly attests to his extraordinary life - an impoverished and surreal Cuban childhood, a Castro rebel at 16, an enemy of the state (for his homosexuality and writings), a harrowing imprisonment...and 4 years later an escape to the USA and eventual HIV driven suicide.Before Night Falls is also an interesting overview of the underground Cuban literary scene of the 1970s. The only problems are a sometimes repetitive and preachy text (he dfinitely has an axe to grind!). Still - the rewarding story of a profoundly fascinating and important man with a voracious hunger for sex, writing, and above all freedom.
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