The Tower of the Antilles

• The Tower of the Antilles.

"Questions of personal and national identity percolate through the stories in Obejas's memorable short fiction collection, most of which is set in Cuba, the author's birthplace...These 10 stories show Obejas's talent, illuminating Cuban culture and the innermost lives of her characters." ―Publishers Weekly"By turns searing and subtly magical, the stories in Obejas' vividly imagined collection are propelled by her characters' contradictory feelings about and unnerving experiences in Cuba...For all the human tumult and deftly sketched and reverberating historical and cultural contexts that Obejas incisively creates in these poignant, alarming tales, she also offers lyrical musings on the mysteries of the sea and the vulnerability of islands and the body. Obejas' plots are ambushing, her characters startling, her metaphors fresh, her humor caustic, and her compassion potent in these intricate and haunting stories of displacement, loss, stoicism, and realization." ―Booklist "Obejas's stories demonstrate an acute understanding of being caught between two places and cultures as different as America and Cuba." ―Library Journal "Achy Obejas's collection is about fictional Cuban migrants who never quite escape the land they've left." ―Electric Literature "It's a joy to return to Obejas's work; her prose, crisp, crystalline, and controlled, covering the wide spectrums of anger, desire, longing, and wonder in the face of immigration...Obejas sneaks under the skin, revealing emotions tied up at the dock, cuts the rope, and sets them free. The Tower of the Antilles proves, once again, why Achy Obejas is one of the most important Cuban writers of our time." ―The Miami Rail "This summer is the perfect rtunity to get to know the work of this Cuban-American writer. The stories collected in her new book tell the story of various Cubas―Cuba throughout the ages, Cuba from different perspectives, but always Cuba in all its vibrant, troubled, conflicting beauty." ―Barnes & Noble/B&N Reads, included in"12 Must-Read Indie Books Coming This Summer" Praise for Achy Obejas: "Obejas writes like an angel, which is to say: gloriously...one of Cuba's most important writers." ―Junot Diaz The Cubans in Achy Obejas's story collection are haunted by islands: the island they fled, the island they've created, the island they were taken to or forced from, the island they long for, the island they return to, and the island that can never be home again. In "Superman," several possible story lines emerge about a 1950s Havana sex-show superstar who disappeared as soon as the revolution triumphed. "North/South" portrays a migrant family trying to cope with separation, lives on different hemispheres, and the eventual disintegration of blood ties. "The Cola of Oblivion" follows the path of a young woman who returns to Cuba, and who inadvertently uncorks a history of accommodation and betrayal among the family members who stayed behind during the revolution. In the title story, "The Tower of the Antilles," an interrogation reveals a series of fantasies about escape and a history of futility. With language that is both generous and , Obejas writes about existences beset by events beyond individual control, and poignantly captures how history and e intrude on even the most ordinary of lives.