Waiting For Snow in Havana

Carlos Eire wrote this book Waiting for Snow in Havana, Confessions of a Cuban Boy.  The author has a PhD from Yale and typically writes textbooks about art in the 16th and 17th centuries. He was motivated to write this story after hearing the story of Elian Gonzales in the news.  Do you remember Elian Gonzales?  He was the little Cuban boy in Miami whose mother perished on the boat ride on the way to Florida.  His father lived in Cuba and wanted his son back home.  Fidel Castro wanted Elian to come home. Elian's relatives in Miami wanted to keep him in the United States.  I remember seeing the images of armed men breaking into a bedroom and pulling a crying boy out of a closet.  This story infuriated the author because, as a child, Fidel didn't care that he and 14,000 other children aged 8-14 were sent to the United States with no one there to take care of them.  The author writes in short chapters describing his life in Cuba with his father (a wealthy judge who had to have mental illness), his mother (a loving woman with a weak leg), his brother, and his tormentor (a boy named Ernesto who is adopted by Carlos' father and who repeatedly attempts to molest him).  Carlos and his brother have a privileged life in Cuba.  They are wild boys without much discipline.  They enjoy throwing rocks at each other and pulling the tails off lizards.  They enjoy riding their bikes behind the DDT fogging truck as it spreads mosquito insecticide throughout their neighborhood. Carlos describes the beauty and culture of old Havana and it sounds rather nice.  Castro comes into power and things change.  The author describes in vivid detail the Bay of Pigs incident.  His father is attacked for driving such a fancy car to the courthouse and ends up trading in his nice car for an old Ford.  Eventually the mother realizes they will be better off in the United States.  His father is lost in his own little world and does nothing to help them. She manages to get the boys out of the country as part of the "Operation Peter Pan,"  She hopes to follow right behind them but is unable to get to them for three years.  Carlos and his brother are on their own for three years in a foreign country and they're not even 15 years old yet.  How he got from that deplorable situation to a PhD is something he covers in the sequel, "Waiting to Die in Miami."  I am tempted to read that.  Although I didn't always like the writing style, I'm glad I finished the book.