Havana Blue

This is a fascinating look at Cuba in the 1970s and '80s - Lt. Mario Conde is assigned to solve a case that carries him back to his days as an ambitious young high school student (he's now your classically cynical detective, who drinks too much and has two failed marriages). My only complaint about this book is the quality of the translation - it feels as if it were translated too literally, leading to a stilted, unnatural story rather than conveying the sense of the story and dialogue. Still worth the read, though.

I discovered this book through the podcast "A Strong Sense of Place", episode 11: Cuba: Castro, Conga, Cars, and Cigars. If you've never heard of it, the premise of the podcast is to discuss books that provide a strong sense of place featured in each episode. Among the 5 books discussed in this episode was "Havana Fever", the 4th installment in the Mario Conde Series. I realized that I had read his novel "The Man Who Loved Dogs", and had enjoyed his writing style. I wanted to start at the beginning of the series and I am glad that I did!
Blue Havana is Cuban Crime noir, and so much more. The disappearance of Rafael Morin, an important business manager and 'reliable comrade' is a McGuffin, an event that helps us get to know Mario, or "the show more Count", a boozy detective in Havana, his past, his dreams, and his desires, as well as his day to day habits and interests. (Among which are Hemingway, rock n roll, baseball jazz, and drinking).
Mario can't explain why he became a police officer; he once vowed to become a writer, and nothing else in front of a photo of Hemingway., "the idol he most worshipped" Although he is a gifted policeman, he no longer writes...he would like to be 16 again, in order to reshape his past:" there couldn't be a repeat of the long chain of errors and coincidences that had shaped his existence ". (Who hasn't felt that way!)
This disappearance brings up his past because Rafael was a schoolmate of Mario's. His "strolls down memory lane always ended in melancholy ", and in trying to solve the disappearance, Mario's calm solitude is disturbed as he confronts regret, disillusionment, and the dreams he, as well as his " lost, faceless" generation, had deferred...
"What have you made of your life Mario Conde, he asked himself daily as he attempted to reverse the time machine and one by one right his own wrongs, disappointments and excesses, anger and hatred, cast off his errant ways and find the exact point at which to start afresh."
Wow! Insightful writing. The translation is quite good...only one or 2 clunkers...calling a zipper a zip, and a car horn a klaxon. The writing alone hooked me, but the story and sense of place truly made it a book I strongly recommend and will never loan out! I bookmarked many beautiful, moving passages.
And if I had any doubts about continuing the series, the ending paragraph wowed me even more.
"He stretched out a hand towards his bookcase and picked out the only book that had never accumulated dust. 'May it be very squalid and moving', he repeated loudly and read the story of the man who knew all the secrets of the banana fish, which is maybe why he killed him and fell asleep thinking the story was pure squalor because of the quiet brilliance of the suicide." show less

Gritty, gritty Havana--a backdrop for sweet memories of youth and the aftermath of living a life you never wanted (as a cop). The woman you wanted returns taken, the man you hated (the one who never failed and was making it towards the top of the party) does not. And you and your friends drink rum and eat big. You solve the murder as you choke on the life you lead. Gritty. No Socialist
Realism here.

A Cuban mystery about a policeman's high school acquaintance who goes missing and the investigation into his whereabouts. Introduces us to the detective, his friends and coworkers and his high school crush. This is the first book I've read that is written by a Cuban who is still living in Cuba and the details about life there were fantastic. The translation feels a little clunky occasionally. There were times where I could feel the words wanting to sing but being held back by translation issues. Definitely worth your time if you like mysteries set in non-American places. It is particularly interesting to compare the voluptuous language with the spareness of Icelandic and Swedish mysteries.

Mario Conde is a Cuiban police lieutenant haunted by his desire - and failure - to write. He is investigating the disappearance of an old school-mate - the big man on campus that married the girl Conde also desired - and failed to get. The third mystery in Leonardo Padura Fuentes' series featuring Conde is as fresh and compelling as the first two, with astute observations of the hardships, and class divide, characteristic of life in Cuba.

Mario Conde, el detective a cargo de investigar la desaparicion de un encargado de negocios internacionales, conocio al desaparecido en sus anos de instituto, preuniversitario, por lo que la invesitigacion llevara al detective a recordar esta epoca de su pasado. Los recuerdos de Conde, y la investigacion, permiten al lector acercarse al el sistema social cubano, conocer detalles sobre la vida de los habitantes de Havana, sobre sus viviendas, sus comidas, sus trabajos, sobre como emplean el tiempo libre, sobre como se relacionan... Las descripciones son ricas y se entrelazan bien con la historia detectivesca y con el desarrollo de los personajes. Esta es una novela policiaca mucho mejor escrita que la mayoria en el genero, con un show more detective interesante y humano y con personajes secundarios que merecen ser desarrollados en novelas posteriores. show less

Mario Conde is a middle aged detective in Havana Cuba whose high school years, friends, enemies, sports and loves loom large over his life. His two failed marriages are a bit of police cliche, and the book--were it more sparsely written--might qualify in many places as noir. However, the author's sometimes flowery, almost Proustian reminiscences flood and saturate the plot. The characters are much more shallow than the intricate tales of memories, past experiences, and embarrassments.

Conde is assigned a 'hot' case with scrutiny from top Cuban administrators. A director of a government enterprise has turned up missing, and in a twist of fate that drives the book, the director's wife is the obsession since high school of Conde. The show more impossibly beautiful Tamara, infinitely out of reach, becomes a daily conversant with Conde as for many pages the investigation is stalled and memories are processed. Out of the blue the investigation starts moving and the author blitzes past details, haltingly describes crimes, and closes out the book in a streak. The redeeming fact of the book is that sometimes, in time, one can have the victory of a lifetime. show less