Negative Positive
Title: Balmy seas, coconuts and Fidel Castro
Review: This finalist for the National Book Award tellsthe story of three generations of a Cuban family.Indelible images and vivid characters combine to create a dreamlike evocation of Cuban life. Celia del Pino is the matriarch of a family that spans from Havana to Brooklyn, New York. She is unswervingly patriotic in her support of Fidel Castro, while her daughter Lourdes in the United States has embraced her new life and its capitalism by opening a chain of bakeries. Celia's second daughter is ambivalent toward the revolution as she deals with abuse and mental illness. Mothers and daughters may disagree, but Celia's granddaughter forms an emotional bond with her faraway grandmother. Using fragmentary vignettes, Dreaming in Cuban is reminiscent of stories repeated down through the generations, and the reader feels a connection to this family. Try it if you liked How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents by Julia Alvarez or The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields.
Is the review positive or negative? 