Douglass K. Daniel
‘Havana Requiem’ is a legal thriller with spice
“Havana Requiem: a Legal Thriller” (Farrar, Straus and Giroux), by Paul Goldstein: Attorney and novelist Paul Goldstein manages the enviable feat of writing a compelling legal thriller without ever putting his characters in the less-than-thrilling venue of a courtroom.
Instead, the action in “Havana Requiem” takes place in Cuba’s capital in a plot permeated with dangerous, steamy intrigue. The setting fits for a story that turns on notions of freedom of expression and freedom to dream.
New York lawyer Michael Seeley, the leading character in two previous Goldstein novels, is trying to re-establish his career as a top intellectual property lawyer while putting behind him a failed marriage, a drinking problem and a professional meltdown. When Cuban musician Hector Reynoso seeks his help, Seeley sees an opportunity to regain his self-respect as well as assist some deserving artists.
What Reynoso desires is refreshingly unusual for such a story: the rights to the traditional Cuban music he and other elderly composers wrote before the revolution. Sure, there’s money involved — big money — but there’s also the matter of preserving Cuban culture.
Those millions of dollars in fees have been going somewhere, certainly not to the composers, and suggest that Seeley should take more than a little care when rooting around the legal hurdles facing his clients in the U.S. and in Castro’s Cuba. Music has its political dimensions, too, and can undermine authority in the right conditions.
Persuading the aging Cubans to sign on to the effort to get their music back takes Seeley on an almost covert mission to Havana. Trying to perform a simple task puts him at odds with the secret police, ambiguous American officials and a Cuban beauty, Amaryll Cruz, who is as enigmatic as the island nation.
“This is the most subversive music of all,” Amaryll warns. “It makes practical people dream.”
While Goldstein creates a satisfying legal puzzle, it’s his description of a city and citizenry floating through life under Castro that gives “Havana Requiem” its heart and soul.
___
Douglass K. Daniel is the author of “Tough as Nails: The Life and Films of Richard Brooks” (University of Wisconsin Press).
‘Solitary House’ a mystery with a dose of Dickens
“The Solitary House” (Delacorte Press), by Lynn Shepherd: The star of Lynn Shepherd’s intriguing mystery novel is mid-century Victorian London, depicted in all its filthy glory and without a hint of the jolly charm that found its way into the tales of Charles Dickens.
But then charm is hardly the point in “The Solitary House.” Shepherd artfully mixes a tale of murder with elements common to Dickens’ writing, such as the prostitutes, rat catchers and other unfortunates who populate London’s foul, gas-lighted streets and the powerful, selfish gentry who control the lives of so many others.
Continue Reading CloseIn novel ‘The Right-Hand Shore,’ past is a burden
“The Right-Hand Shore” (Farrar, Straus and Giroux), by Christopher Tilghman: “A place like this holds history,” observes Wyatt Bayly, the new master of a vast Eastern Shore estate known as the Retreat. “It drives you back into the past just living here.”
In a different context, a young girl named Beal, descended from slaves on the place, tries to move beyond old customs and laments, “We don’t care about all this history.”
The past has a way of making hearts ache in Christopher Tilghman’s excellent novel “The Right-Hand Shore.” Set in Maryland in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, his story explores the desires that drive people to try to overcome the past. Their efforts are all the more difficult because they keep looking back on the paths already traveled instead of the ones ahead of them.
Continue Reading CloseA political tip sheet for the rest of us
President Barack Obama speaks in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building across from the White House in Washington, Wednesday, April 4, 2012, before he signed the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge (STOCK) Act. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)(Credit: AP) A political tip sheet for the rest of us outside the Washington Beltway, for Wednesday, April 4, 2012:
WHAT HAPPENED
ROMNEY VS. HIDE AND SEEK: Mitt Romney has unleashed a strong attack on President Barack Obama’s truthfulness, accusing him of running a “hide-and-seek” re-election campaign designed to distract voters from his first-term record while denying them information about his plans for a second. Addressing an audience of newspaper editors and publishers, Romney said Obama’s recent remarks to Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on a second-term arms reduction treaty had called “his candor into question.” Romney, the likely GOP opponent for Obama in November, also accused the president of undergoing “a series of election-year conversions” on taxes, government regulation and energy production. “He does not want to share his real plans before the election, either with the public or with the press,” Romney said. “By flexibility, he means that what the American public doesn’t know won’t hurt him. He is intent on hiding. You and I will have to do the seeking.” Romney himself has been sharply criticized by Rick Santorum and other Republican rivals for changing his own positions on issues ranging from abortion to climate control as part of an attempt to win the backing of conservative primary voters.
Continue Reading CloseGOP ad plays with audio from Supreme Court hearing
Solicitor General Donald B. Verrilli, Jr., speaks in front of the Supreme Court in Washington, Tuesday, March 27, 2012, as the court continued hearings on the health care law signed by President Barack Obama. Justices, seated from left are, Sonia Sotomayor, Stephen Breyer, Clarence Thomas, Antonin Scalia, Chief Justice John Roberts, Anthony Kennedy, Ruth Bader Ginsburg Samuel Alito and Elana Kagan. (AP Photo/Dana Verkouteren)(Credit: AP) WASHINGTON (AP) — A website ad from the Republican National Committee edits audio from this week’s Supreme Court hearing on the health care law to exaggerate Solicitor General Donald Verrilli’s struggle to find the words to defend President Barack Obama’s initiative.
The ad shows a photograph of the Supreme Court Building as it plays audio from Tuesday’s arguments on the constitutionality of the mandate that all Americans have health care insurance. As Verrilli speaks, the ad flashes the words: “ObamaCare. It’s a tough sell.”
Continue Reading CloseA political tip sheet for the rest of us
FILE - In this March 23, 2012 file photo, Republican presidential candidate, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney speaks in Metairie, La. The unemployment rate doesn't matter to Rick Santorum. Newt Gingrich has more baggage than the airlines. Both are compromised Washington insiders who have bent their principles for money and influence. So say Mitt Romney and his allies. (AP Photo/Steven Senne, File)(Credit: AP) A political tip sheet for the rest of us outside the Washington Beltway, for Thursday, March 29, 2012:
WHAT HAPPENED:
ROMNEY’S AD STRATEGY: In the television ad world created by Mitt Romney and his allies, Rick Santorum doesn’t care about the unemployment rate. Newt Gingrich has “more baggage than the airlines.” And both are Washington insiders who have bent their principles for money and influence. That advertising playbook has helped make Romney his Republican Party’s likely presidential nominee and could offer a preview of what awaits President Barack Obama in the general election campaign. Voters in early primary states have seen plenty of this ad strategy already: a torrent of attacks on Romney’s opponents along with a few positive spots about the GOP front-runner’s biography and business experience. The strategy, devised by Romney’s campaign and an allied independent group, has been focused and unforgiving, all but eviscerating his rivals while portraying Romney as an effective manager and devoted family man. Democratic media strategist Tad Devine says the approach has served Romney well so far but will face limitations against Obama, who will not lack for resources to go after his challenger on the air. “There’s a great risk to the strategy he’s pursued,” Devine said of Romney. “When you define yourself as totally negative, you don’t give voters any reassurance against the attacks that might be made against you.”
Continue Reading ClosePage 1 of 2 in Douglass K. Daniel