
This Is Cuba
An American Journalist Under Castro's Shadow
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Narrated by:
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David Ariosto
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By:
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David Ariosto
About this listen
Fidel Castro is dead. Donald Trump was elected president. And to most outsiders, the fate of Cuba has never seemed more uncertain. Yet those who look close enough may recognize that signs of the next revolution are etched in plain view.
This is Cuba is a true story that begins in the summer of 2009 when a young American photo-journalist is offered the chance of a lifetime - a two-year assignment in Havana.
For David Ariosto, the island is an intriguing new world, unmoored from the one he left behind. From neighboring military coups, suspected honey traps, salty spooks, and desperate migrants to dissidents, doctors, and Havana’s empty shelves, Ariosto uncovers the island’s subtle absurdities, its Cold War mystique, and the hopes of a people in the throes of transition. Beyond the classic cars, salsa, and cigars lies a country in which black markets are ubiquitous, free speech is restricted, privacy is curtailed, sanctions wreak havoc, and an almost Kafka-esque goo of Soviet-style bureaucracy still slows the gears of an economy desperate to move forward.
But life in Cuba is indeed changing, as satellite dishes and internet hotspots dot the landscape and more Americans want in. Still, it’s not so simple. The old sentries on both sides of the Florida Straits remain at their posts, fists clenched and guarding against the specter of a Cold War that never quite ended, despite the death of Fidel and the hand-over of the presidency to a man whose last name isn’t Castro.
And now, a crisis is brewing.
In This Is Cuba, Ariosto looks at Cuba from the inside-out over the course of nine years, endeavoring to expose clues for what’s in store for the island as it undergoes its biggest change in more than half a century.
©2018 David Ariosto (P)2018 Brilliance Publishing, Inc., all rights reserved. Published by arrangement with St. Martin's Press.Listeners also enjoyed...
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great overview on Cuba very interesting
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Great historical story
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David Ariosto has done a great job with this.
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Very well written book by a journalist.
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Very well done and personal
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A complete review of the real Cuba
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great insight into Cuban life
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A ring side seat perspective. Fascinating. Read like a novel.
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A slice of an interesting life
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This is both a memoir of the author's stay in Cuba in 2009-2010 as well as the contemporary history of Cuba. David Ariosto interviews the Cuban commoner and tells us their personal story of the shop vendor, the maid, the taxi driver, the dissident in Miami. Ariosto knows the island well and interjects the listener with history and how it relates to Cubans today.
My only complaint is that he speaks rather fast at times, but you do get used to the pace.
Memoir and history
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