Loving Che

Praise for
Loving Che:

“Loving Che
displays the same radar for the telling emotional detail that Ms. Menéndez's impressive
[In Cuba I Was a German Shepherd]
did …
[Loving Che]
appears to take as its model the intense, lyrical voice of Marguerite Duras's best-selling 1985 novel
The Lover
. … Expands the talented Ms. Menéndez's fictional terrain.”

—Michiko Kakutani,
The New York Times

“Splendid … What makes
Loving Che
truly memorable is Menéndez's intense imagining of Teresa's Havana. … Che's photographs add bright images of youth and nostalgia, snapshots of a lost world.”

—Richard Wallace,
The Seattle Times

“[Menéndez] brings alive the spirit of Guevara and the heart of the revolution in a novel that aches with longing, loss, and lust-driven love. … Menéndez pays tribute to her people and her culture in
Loving Che.”

—Carol Memmott,
USA Today

“A beautiful and quite possible reinvention of history.”

—Alan Cheuse, NPR

“Inventive and hypnotic …
[Loving Che
is] Menéndez's deliciously mischievous take on the exile's endless capacity to blur history—both personal and political—into myth. … A tart fable about history and identity that is equal parts detective story, travelogue, and fever dream.”

—Mark Rozzo,
Los Angeles Times Book Review

“The pain and loneliness of exile … permeates this poetic, fragmentary first novel by Ana Menéndez. … Conjoin[s] love and history and politics into a powerful mélange. One of the strengths of this book is that while its backdrop is one of the most politically charged events since World War II, Menéndez's focus is on a much more intimate drama; she uses the revolution because it illuminates her theme of separation. … Menéndez's literary sensibility also reveals itself in strongly, often beautifully poetic prose.”

—Timothy Peters,
San Francisco Chronicle

“A moving commentary on the Cuban diaspora in Miami. …
Loving Che
is at its best when it subtly details the Cuban migration. … Menéndez does an excellent job conveying the longing some Cubans have for their homeland.”

—Andrea Ahles,
Star-Telegram

“[A] poised and elegant first novel … It is breathtakingly convincing … its mood is perfect.”

—
The Irish Tatler
(Dublin)

“The power and beauty of the framing narrative … suggests that Menéndez may be up to something much smarter and more ambitious than another overtly familiar tale of doomed lovers in exotic circumstances. … The writing is gorgeous, and the portrayal of Havana under the revolution as one of romantic decay is … sharply rendered. … A finely tuned modernist novel in the tradition of Italo Calvino or Vladimir Nabokov.”

—Chauncey Mabe,
San Antonio Express-News

“A refreshingly different take on a subject and country about which few people are neutral.”

—Nickie Witham,
City Life
(UK)

“Loving Che
deftly captures the fluid sense of identity that accompanied the now mythic early days of Cuba's revolution. … Menéndez is at her best when depicting [the] social detail, revealing what life is like for many Cubans today. She captures Cuba's potential, its desperation and decay, and also its dark humor.”

—Ruth Lopez,
The New York Times Book Review

“[Loving Che]
puts [Menéndez] in the company of other Latino writers such as Junot D'az and Sandra Cisneros. … Capture[s] the spirit of revolution and unrest in Havana in the late fifties and early sixties.”

—
Vanity Fair

“[Menéndez's] details are so palpable, her narrative so believable, and her research so deeply imbedded in her story … that readers could easily be hoodwinked into thinking they were reading a memoir instead of a novel. … In addition to being an exuberant and poetic look at loss and memory,
Loving Che
is also … an enticingly erotic reimagining of the passionate first days of the Cuban Revolution.”

—Chris Watson,
The Santa Cruz Sentinel

“[Menéndez] has written an evocative, if fleeting, love letter to a salt-of-the-earth guerrilla lover, a vanished world and the eternal ruins of memory.”

—Anderson Tepper,
Time Out

“The story, flicking back and forth in time as one would flick through a photo album, paints a powerful portrait of Cuba, and dwells on the fine line between the shadows of imaginings and the solidity of reality.”

—Philippa Logan,
The Oxford Times

“[Menéndez] vividly renders a wounded yet optimistic Havana, wracked with both violence and exhilaration in the early years of the revolution. … She deftly weaves many well-known details from Che's life into the figure of a dream lover.”

—Katie Millbauer,
Seattle Weekly

“It is a story about romance, memory, fiction, and betrayal, all strong themes within the Cuban exile community. … Menéndez paints a rich and dazzling portrait of revolutionary Cuba, and anyone interested in the country will be delighted by the book's strong and specific sense of place.”

—Chelsea Cain,
Bookmarks

“This is a rich, unpretentious book, with a series of lessons on the power … of memory. … Menéndez's voice is fresh, inviting, and original.”

—Carlyn Kolker,
The Washington Times

“We are given a sense of the exciting changes and fears, hopes, and mores of those heady and volatile early days of the revolution.
Loving Che
is a well crafted contemplation of history and myth, storytelling and memory.”

—Robert Birnbaum,
The Morning News

“Eloquent … Menéndez effortlessly switches between the two voices—that of the daughter, questioning but pragmatic, and of the mother, romantic, daring, and dramatic. … The writing is consistently beautiful. Highly recommended.”

—Mary Margaret Benson,
Library Journal

“[Menéndez] explores this explosive era in [Cuba's] history in gorgeously atmospheric, intimately rendered prose.”

—
Elle

“Menéndez's book is clever, and well constructed. The style of Teresa's writings is that of romantic fiction; the other parts more investigative memoir; the descriptions of Cuba rich and resonant. She spins out her enigmas with skill, giving readers food for thought about loss, and about the impossible dualities of Cuba itself and of individual lives within it.”

—Julia Sutherland,
The Financial Times

“[Loving Che]
brings the Cuban experience to life.”

—Michael Spinella,
Booklist

“Evocative … Teresa's poetic memories … are rich in sensual detail … and full of the terror and exhilaration of revolution. … The glimpses of vibrant 1950s Cuba and Teresa and Che's perfectly rendered relationship make this a moving novel from a writer to watch.”

—
Publishers Weekly

“In Ana Menéndez's first novel,
Loving Che,
a young Cuban-American woman grapples to find [a] sense of self. … [The young woman's] quest for discovery turns into an exhilarating detective story, where most of the clues are embedded in very raw emotions.”

—
Weirton Times

“Convincing and compelling … Both parts of
[Loving Che]
—in Teresa's voice and in her daughter's—do considerably more rather than less to evoke the flavor and feeling of Havana, both the exotic and the dismal, with doubts, anomalies, and long, deep affections and sorrows intact.”

—
Kirkus Reviews

“Like the story of Cuba itself,
[Loving Che]
is ultimately a history of disillusion, the pain of exile, and the continuing search for a credible sense of identity and place in history. … Teresa's account aspires to, and very often achieves, that peculiarly Spanish blend of poetic luxury and economy of expression perfected by Lorca.”

—Stephanie Merritt,
The Observer
(UK)

LOVING CHE

Also by Ana Menéndez

In Cuba I Was a German Shepherd

Ana Menéndez

Copyright © 2003 by Ana Menéndez

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review. Any members of educational institutions wishing to photocopy part or all of the work for classroom use, or publishers who would like to obtain permission to include the work in an anthology, should send their inquiries to Grove/Atlantic, Inc., 841 Broadway, New York, NY 10003.

The author and publisher gratefully acknowledge the following for the right to reprint material in the book: pp. 9, 14, 120, 121: “Letter on the Road” by Pablo Neruda, Translated by Donald D. Walsh, from THE CAPTAIN'S VERSES © 1972 by Pablo Neruda and Donald D. Walsh. Reprinted by permission of New Directions Publishing Corp.; p. 13: 1968, “Cuban artist's installation” © Fred Mayer/MAGNUM PHOTOS; p. 50: 1958, “National tribute to Che Guevara” © CORBIS SYGMA; p. 55: 1958, “National tribute to Che Guevara” © CORBIS SYGMA; p. 83: 1958, “National tribute to Che Guevara” © CORBIS SYGMA; p. 87: “Ernesto Che Guevara” © CORBIS SYGMA; p. 100: 1960 “Ernesto Che Guevara” © Andrew Saint-George/MAGNUM PHOTOS; p. 123: “Ernesto Che Guevara” © CORBIS SYGMA; p. 126: 1967, “Ernesto Che Guevara's body” © Hulton-Deutsch Collection/CORBIS; p. 156: “1963 Ernesto Che Guevara” © Rene Burri/MAGNUM PHOTOS; p. 163: “El Encanto” courtesy of Don Julio, Asociacion de Antiguos Empleados de El Encanto, Inc.; p. 226: “Ernesto Che Guevara” © CORBIS SYGMA.

Published simultaneously in Canada
Printed in the United States of America

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Menéndez, Ana, 1970–

Loving Che/Ana Menéndez.

p. cm.

eBook ISBN-13: 978-1-5558-4788-3

1. Cuban American women—Fiction. 2. Guevara, Ernesto, 1928—1967—Fiction. 3. Illegitimate children—Fiction. 4. Mothers and daughters—Fiction. 5. Americans—Cuba—Fiction 6. Revolutionaries—Fiction. 7. Women—Cuba—Fiction. 8. Birthmothers—Fiction. 9. Miami (Fla.)—Fiction. 10. Cuba—Fiction. I. Title.

PS3563.E514L68 2004
813′.6—dc22                      2003060714

Grove Press
an imprint of Grove/Atlantic, Inc.
841 Broadway
New York, NY 10003

For Dex

Whenever I travel, I like to spend the last day of my journey in the old part of town, lingering for hours in junk stores whose dusty shelves, no matter where in the world they may be, always seem to be piled high with old magazines and books and yellowed photographs. I am a nervous flier, and this excavating into other people's memories never fails to soothe my fears on the eve of departure. The photographs of strangers, especially, have always brought me a gentle peace, and over the years I have amassed a large collection of serious and formal-looking people caught in the camera's moment. Many of the subjects of these old photographs, I've come to notice, carry a grave shadow about their mouths, as if they were already resisting the assertion that these images might represent their true selves. Some nights, when the blue hour is falling, I will take out one of my photographs and imagine that the stranger caught there is a half-forgotten old aunt, or a great-grandmother who smoked cigarettes from a long silver holder. But I know that I'm playing a game with history. For all my imaginings, these images will remain individual mysteries, numbed and forever silenced by the years between us.