Lights Out

“Dania was eleven the first time she meets a Judas Goat, a chivato. Likened to the goats that lead animals to the slaughter, the informants of communist Cuba would do anything to please the authorities. This one has his ear almost pressed against her neighbor’s door.

As an adult, Dania reflects on the chivato who terrified her. The incident sticks in her mind, and it isn’t the only danger she encounters under communist rule.

Suspicion and fear will follow.

Dania chronicles Fidel Castro’s rise to power and the truth behind the dictator. His fascination with Hitler, Mussolini, and other fascists lead to a totalitarian state of sorrow and pain. At the same time, she shows a deep love and respect for the history and culture of Cuba. Lights Out combines the childhood intimacy of Eire’s Waiting for Snow in Havana with the hard-hitting historical accuracy and relevance of Demick’s Nothing to Envy. Castro is determined to erase the past, but Lights Out is a monument to the Cuba before Castro.”

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The Year 200

“The best and most popular novelist of this genre that the island has ever given.” —Yoss

“Agustín de Rojas authored a trilogy that pushes the boundaries of our imaginations.” —SF Signal

”The cult classic from the godfather of Cuban science fiction, Agustín de Rojas’s The Year 200 is both a visionary sci-fi masterwork and a bold political parable about the perils of state power.

Centuries have passed since the Communist Federation defeated the capitalist Empire, but humanity is still divided. A vast artificial-intelligence network, a psychiatric bureaucracy, and a tiny egalitarian council oversee civil affairs and quash ‘abnormal’ attitudes such as romantic love. Disillusioned civilians renounce the new society and either forego technology to live as ‘primitives’ or enhance their brains with cybernetic implants to become ‘cybos.’ When the Empire returns and takes over the minds of unsuspecting citizens in a scenario that terrifyingly recalls Invasion of the Body Snatchers, the world’s fate falls into the hands of two brave women.

Drawing as much from the realms of the adventure novel, spy thriller, and political satire as from hard science fiction, horror, and fantasy, The Year 200 has been proven prophetic in its consideration of cryogenic freezing, artificial intelligence, and state surveillance, while its advanced weapons and robot assassins exist in an all-too-imaginable future. Originally published in 1990, just after the fall of the Berlin Wall and before the onset of Cuba's devastating Special Period, Agustín de Rojas’s magnum opus brings contemporary trajectories to their logical extremes and boldly asks, ‘What does the greatest good for the greatest number really mean?”

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33 Revolutions

“A young man’s political awakening takes shape in the aftermath of Castro’s Revolution in this ‘prayer of a novel’ by the grandson of Che Guevara” - Cleaver Magazine

”At the dawn of Communist Cuba, our unnamed hero, a young black Cuban man, loses his father to death and his mother to emigration. Now he spends much of his time with his Russian neighbor, discovering the pleasures of reading. The books he reads gradually open his eyes to the incongruity between party slogans and the oppressive reality that surrounds him: the office routine; the daily complaints of his colleagues; his own obsessive thoughts which circulate around his mind like a broken record.

Every day, he photographs the spontaneous eruptions of dissent on the streets and witnesses the sad spectacle of young people crowding onto makeshift rafts to escape the island. His frustration grows until a day when he declares his unwillingness to become an informer. And this is when his real troubles begin.”

“Not since Reinaldo Arenas has a Cuban literary voice arrived on American shores with such beaten madness, and sense of personal desperation.” —Cleaver Magazine

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The Island of Eternal Love

"A magical new novel ‘of loss and love across more than a century of Cuba's past.’ -Chicago Sun-Times)

"It's a rich, moving, musical novel, which has already won the Best Spanish Language Book prize in the Florida Book Awards, and that only makes you wonder where the English versions are of the rest of Chaviano's works." -LOCUS Magazine

“Melodious . . . reminiscent of Isabel Allende’s The House of the Spirits . . . a dream-like haze hangs over the novel from start to finish.” -Críticas

”Alone in a city that haunts her, far from her family, her history, and the island she left behind, Cecelia seeks refuge in a bar in Little Havana where a mysterious old woman's fascinating tale keeps Cecelia returning night after night. Her powerful story of long-vanished epochs weaves the saga of three families from far-flung pieces of the world whose connection forms the kind of family that Cecelia has long been missing-one cast from legendary, unbreakable love. As Cecelia falls under the story's heady sway, she discovers the source of the visions that plague her, and a link to the past she cannot shake.”

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Firefly

“Firefly is a dream-like evocation of pre-war Cuba, replete with hurricanes, mystical cults, and slave-markets. The story is the coming-of-age of a precocious and exuberant boy with an oversized head and underdeveloped sense of direction, who views the world as a threatening conspiracy. Told in breathless and lyrical prose, the novel is a loving rendition of a long-lost home, a meditation on exile, and an allegory of Cuba’s isolation in the world.”

“The penultimate novel by Sarduy. This book would seem to be a translator’s nightmare, but Fried has maintained the dark beauty and mystery of the work. Sarduy’s circuslike world takes some getting used to …the narrative takes the first of many surreal turns in the first chapter [and soon after], the story loses any linear coherence it has, but the flow of images is dazzling and ultimately quite haunting.” - Kirkus Reviews

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My Lost Cuba

“Dramatic history, lush scenery, and a colorful cast transport us to the time of Cuba's turning point—the late 1950s.

Set against the tropical landscape of Cuba's countryside and the glamour of 1950s Havana, this moving story of Cuban life at a pivotal time in the country's rich history will resonate with anyone who has experienced the loss of family or homeland.

It is 1958, the last year of Fulgencio Batista's dictatorship. Mike, the son of Don Miguel, a wealthy land owner and rancher, is summoned home from his MBA studies in the United States because of his father's failing health. Still recovering from the loss of his wife, Mike's return is an immediate tonic for Don Miguel. Caught between his family obligations and his desire to pursue his own dreams, Mike quickly finds himself succumbing to his father's desire for him to take over the responsibilities of running the family ranch. As Mike settles back into the life he was groomed for, Don Miguel, reinvigorated, spends more and more time socializing in Havana.

Changes are happening everywhere. The government is encroaching on civil liberties and social and political upheaval is in the air. There are rumblings about Castro's guerillas organizing in the mountains. On the ranch, long-time employees of Don Miguel resent the changes that Mike is making, setting the stage for a confrontation that change the lives of everyone involved.

With evocative language, vibrant characters, and explosive history, My Lost Cuba pulls us into fascinating time and place.”

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Smilla’s Sense of Snow (aka Miss Smilla's Feeling for Snow)

Named Best Book of the Year by Time, Entertainment Weekly & People magazines

“She thinks more highly of snow and ice than she does of love. She lives in a world of numbers, science and memories—a dark, exotic stranger in a strange land. And now Smilla Jaspersen is convinced she has uncovered a shattering crime...

It happened in the Copenhagen snow. A six-year-old boy, a Greenlander like Smilla, fell to his death from the top of his apartment building. While the boy's body is still warm, the police pronounce his death an accident. But Smilla knows her young neighbor didn't fall from the roof on his own.

Soon she is following a path of clues as clear to her as footsteps in the snow. For her dead neighbor, and for herself, she must embark on a harrowing journey of lies, revelation, and violence that will take her back to the world of ice and snow from which she comes, where an explosive secret waits beneath the ice.”

Note: Depending upon your country, this book may be titled Smilla’s Sense of Snow or Miss Smilla's Feeling for Snow.

(Group read suggestion from Ivor Watkins, book club moderator.)

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Flowers over the Inferno

“Ilaria Tuti’s debut thriller explores a remote community in Northern Italy—a place of secrets, eerie folktales, and primal instincts.

In a quiet village surrounded by ancient woods and the imposing Italian Alps, a man is found naked with his eyes gouged out. It is the first in a string of gruesome murders.

Superintendent Teresa Battaglia, a detective with a background in criminal profiling, is called to investigate. Battaglia is in her mid-sixties, her rank and expertise hard-won from decades of battling for respect in a male-dominated Italian police force. While she’s not sure she trusts the young city inspector assigned to assist her, she sees right away that this is no ordinary case: buried deep in these mountains is a dark history that may endanger a group of eight-year-old children toward whom the killer seems to gravitate.

As Teresa inches closer to the truth, she must also confront the possibility that her body and mind, worn down by age and illness, may fail her before the chase is over.”

(A special thank you to book club member, Ester Elbert for the group read suggestion.)

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Let the Right One In (aka Let Me In)

he international bestselling book which was named Best Novel in Translation

It is autumn 1981 when inconceivable horror comes to Blackeberg, a suburb in Sweden. The body of a teenager is found, emptied of blood, the murder rumored to be part of a ritual killing. Twelve-year-old Oskar is personally hoping that revenge has come at long last—revenge for the bullying he endures at school, day after day. But the murder is not the most important thing on his mind.

A new girl has moved in next door—a girl who has never seen a Rubik's Cube before, but who can solve it at once. There is something wrong with her, though, something odd. And she only comes out at night.

Sweeping top honors at film festivals all over the globe, the film version of Let the Right One In has received the same kind of spectacular raves that have been lavished on the book.”

“It's easy to compare Lindqvist to Clive Barker and Neil Gaiman.” —Dagens Næringsliv

“Absolutely chilling. This page-turner grabs you from the onset and just won't let go.” —L. A. Banks,

“A brilliant take on the vampire myth, and a roaring good story.” —Kelley Armstrong

(Group read suggestion from Ivor Watkins, book club moderator.)

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The Night Before Christmas

“Nikolai Gogol's hilarious and macabre tale of a Christmas Eve with a devil and a romantic twist.

It is the night before Christmas and devilry is afoot. The devil steals the moon and hides it in his pocket. He is thus free to run amok and inflicts all sorts of wicked mischief upon the village of Dikanka by unleashing a snowstorm. But the one he’d really like to torment is the town blacksmith, Vakula, who creates paintings of the devil being vanquished. Vakula is in love with Oksana, but she will have nothing to do with him. Vakula, however, is determined to win her over, even if it means battling the devil.

Taken from Nikolai Gogol’s first successful work, the story collection, Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka, The Night Before Christmas is available here for the first time as a stand-alone novella and is a perfect introduction to the great Russian satirist.”

(Group read suggestion from Mia DeGiovine Chaveco, book club co-founder.)

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Snow

“Dread, yearning, identity, intrigue, the lethal chemistry between secular doubt and Islamic fanaticism—these are the elements that Orhan Pamuk anneals in this masterful, disquieting novel.

An exiled poet named Ka returns to Turkey and travels to the forlorn city of Kars. His ostensible purpose is to report on a wave of suicides among religious girls forbidden to wear their head-scarves. But Ka is also drawn by his memories of the radiant Ipek, now recently divorced. Amid blanketing snowfall and universal suspicion, Ka finds himself pursued by figures ranging from Ipek’s ex-husband to a charismatic terrorist. A lost gift returns with ecstatic suddenness. A theatrical evening climaxes in a massacre. And finding God may be the prelude to losing everything else.

Touching, slyly comic, and humming with cerebral suspense, Snow is of immense relevance to our present moment.”

(A special thank you to book club member, Yurena Bookish for the group read suggestion.)

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Winter Be My Shield

Shortlisted for Best Fantasy Novel in the Aurealis Awards

Original, dramatic and unputdownable, Winter Be My Shield is the first in an epic from a brilliant new Australian talent.

Sierra has a despised and forbidden gift—she raises power from the suffering of others. Enslaved by the king's torturer, Sierra escapes, barely keeping ahead of Rasten, the man sent to hunt her down. then she falls in with dangerous company: the fugitive Prince Cammarian and his crippled foster-brother, Isidro. But Rasten is not the only enemy hunting them in the frozen north and as Sierra's new allies struggle to identify friend from foe, Rasten approaches her with a plan to kill the master they both abhor. Sierra is forced to decide what price she is willing to pay for her freedom and her life.

“Unlikely heroes, villains you will cheer for, and cold that eats your bones. Winter Be My Shield will take you to an unforgiving place, but you won't want to leave it.” —Famed writer, Robin Hobb

(Group read suggestion from Beth McCrea, book club co-founder.)

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Mars Nation

Compulsively readable! The science is also spot on & no wonder, since Brandon Q. Morris is the pseudonym of Matthias Matting, a German physicist & space specialist…

NASA finally made it. The very first human has just set foot on the surface of our neighbor planet. This is the start of a long research expedition that sent four scientists into space.

But the four astronauts of the NASA crew are not the only ones with this destination. The privately financed “Mars for Everyone” initiative (MfE) has also targeted the Red Planet. Twenty men and women have been selected to live there and establish the first extraterrestrial settlement.

Challenges arise even before they reach Mars orbit. The MfE spaceship Santa Maria is damaged along the way. Only the four NASA astronauts can intervene and try to save their lives. No one anticipates the impending catastrophe that threatens their very existence—not to speak of the daily hurdles that an extended stay on an alien planet sets before them. On Mars, a struggle begins for limited resources, human cooperation, and just plain survival.

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Benny & Shrimp

“This bestselling ‘offbeat, down-to- earth love story’ (The Observer, London) is now available in the United States!

An international sensation, this addictively readable tale asks the question: Why is it so impossible to get a relationship between two middle-aged misfits to work?

The answer lies in the story of Shrimp, a young widowed librarian with a sharp intellect and a home so tidy that her jam jars are in alphabetical order; Benny, a gentle, overworked milk farmer who fears becoming the village's Old Bachelor; and an unlikely love that should not be as complicated as it seems.

Reminiscent of the works of Carol Shields, this quirky, humorous, beautifully told novel breathes new life into the age-old conundrum that is love.”

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Beartown

Named one of the best books of the year by LibraryReads, BookBrowse, & Goodreads

“You’ll love this engrossing novel.” -People

”The bestselling author of A Man Called Ove returns with a dazzling, profound novel about a small town with a big dream—and the price required to make it come true.

People say Beartown is finished. A tiny community nestled deep in the forest, it is slowly losing ground to the ever-encroaching trees. But down by the lake stands an old ice rink, built generations ago by the working men who founded this town. And in that ice rink is the reason people in Beartown believe tomorrow will be better than today. Their junior ice hockey team is about to compete in the national semi-finals, and they actually have a shot at winning. All the hopes and dreams of this place now rest on the shoulders of a handful of teenage boys.

Being responsible for the hopes of an entire town is a heavy burden, and the semi-final match is the catalyst for a violent act that will leave a young girl traumatized and a town in turmoil. Accusations are made and, like ripples on a pond, they travel through all of Beartown, leaving no resident unaffected.

Beartown explores the hopes that bring a small community together, the secrets that tear it apart, and the courage it takes for an individual to go against the grain. In this story of a small forest town, Fredrik Backman has found the entire world.”

(A special thank you to book club member, Karen Oliver Lena-Jack for the suggestion.)

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Beyond All Reasonable Doubt

“Giolito has come up with another knockout legal thriller…Sophia Weber is a wonderfully textured creation, a poignant mix of determined braininess and nagging doubts.” -Washington Post

“From the award-winning author of Quicksand, a gripping legal thriller that follows one woman's conflicted efforts to overturn what may be a wrongful conviction.

’I'm giving you a chance to achieve every lawyer's dream,’ said Sophia Weber's old professor. ‘Freeing an innocent man.’

13 years ago, a fifteen-year-old girl was murdered. Dr. Stig Ahlin was sentenced to life in prison. But no one has forgotten the brutal crime. Ahlin is known as one of the most ruthless criminals.

When Sophia Weber discovers critical flaws in the murder investigation, she decides to help Ahlin. But Sophia doing her utmost to get her client exonerated arouses many people's disgust. And the more she learns, the more difficult her job becomes. What kind of man is her client really? What has he done? And will she ever know the truth?”

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Echoes from the Dead

“On a gray September day, on an island off the coast of Sweden, six -year -old Jens Davidsson ventured out of his backyard, walked out into a fog, and vanished….Now twenty years have passed, and in this magnificent debut novel of suspense—a runaway bestseller in Sweden—the boy’s mother returns to the place where her son disappeared, drawn by a chilling package sent in the mail… In it, lovingly wrapped, is one of Jens’ sandals—sandals Julia Davidsson put on her son’s feet that very last morning.

Now, with only a handful of clues, Julia and her father are questioning islanders who were present the day Jens vanished—and making a shocking connection to Öland’s most notorious murder case: the killing spree of a wealthy young man who fled the island and died years before Jens was even born. Suddenly the island that once seemed so achingly familiar turns strange and dangerous… Until Julia finds herself facing truths she never imagined—about what really happened on that September day twenty years ago, about who may have crossed paths with little Jens in the fog, and how a child could truly vanish without a trace…until now.”

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Britt-Marie Was Here

“The NY Times bestselling author of A Man Called Ove returns with this heartwarming story about a woman rediscovering herself after a personal crisis…fans of Backman will find another winner here.” - Publishers Weekly

”Britt-Marie can’t stand mess. A disorganized cutlery drawer ranks high on her list of unforgivable sins. She is not one to judge others—no matter how ill-mannered, unkempt, or morally suspect they might be. It’s just that sometimes people interpret her helpful suggestions as criticisms, which is certainly not her intention.

But hidden inside the socially awkward, fussy busybody is a woman who has more imagination, bigger dreams, and a warmer heart that anyone realizes.

When Britt-Marie walks out on her cheating husband and has to fend for herself in the miserable backwater town of Borg—of which the kindest thing one can say is that it has a road going through it—she finds work as the caretaker of a soon-to-be demolished recreation center. The fastidious Britt-Marie soon finds herself being drawn into the daily doings of her fellow citizens, an odd assortment of miscreants, drunkards, layabouts. Most alarming of all, she’s given the impossible task of leading the supremely untalented children’s soccer team to victory. In this small town of misfits, can Britt-Marie find a place where she truly belongs?

Funny and moving, sweet and inspiring, Britt-Marie Was Here celebrates the importance of community and connection in a world that can feel isolating.”

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Astrid and Veronika

“With extraordinary emotional power, Linda Olsson’s stunningly well-crafted debut novel recounts the unusual and unexpected friendship that develops between two women.

Veronika, a young writer from New Zealand, rents a house in a small Swedish village as she tries to come to terms with a recent tragedy while also finishing a novel. Her arrival is silently observed by Astrid, an older, reclusive neighbor who slowly becomes a presence in Veronika’s life, offering comfort in the form of companionship and lovingly prepared home-cooked meals.

Set against a haunting Swedish landscape, Astrid & Veronika is a lyrical and meditative novel of love and loss, and a story that will remain with readers long after the characters’ secrets are revealed.”

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The Hypnotist

“A riveting new translation of the first installment in the #1 internationally bestselling Joona Linna series, The Hypnotist shows the lengths one determined detective is willing to go to solve a horrific crime.

A gruesome triple homicide attracts the interest of Detective Joona Linna of the National Crime Police. There's only one surviving witness—the boy whose family was killed before his eyes. The only problem is, he's lapsed into a catatonic state.

Desperate for information, Linna enlists trauma expert Dr. Erik Maria Bark, hoping to hypnotize the boy and uncover the secrets locked in his memory. But, scarred by past experiences, Bark has sworn never to use hypnosis again. When the doctor breaks his promise, he triggers a terrifying chain of events that will put all their lives in jeopardy.”

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