La fiesta vigilada. (The Watched Party)

Reviewed by Marie St. Pierre, Casper, WY -- Críticas, 2/15/2008

Ponte, Antonio José. 
Spain: Anagrama, dist by LD Books. 2007. 239p. ISBN 978-84-339-7149-4. pap. $38.90. FICTION

Born in Cuba in 1964, Ponte has been a hydraulic engineer, poet, essayist, novelist, and professor. Using first-person narration and real-life characters and events, this work sheds light on the situation of Cuba and its capital in the 2000s. The protagonist, a Havana resident, analyzes his life, family, friends, and literary colleagues against the backdrop of Graham Greene’s thriller Our Man in Havana. In the following chapters, he examines both the changes in the city’s nightlife from the early 1960s to present and the architecture of the city as a metaphor for growth, decay, and the consequences of the embargo on the island’s finite resources. In the final pages, the protagonist travels to post-Wall Berlin. Written in a humorous, conversational tone and using a quite sophisticated language, this timely book chronicles the social and cultural state of Cuba after close to 50 years of Castro’s leadership. Recommended for academic libraries connected to a Latin American Studies program.

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