Leaving Glorytown: One Boy's Struggle Under Castro

by Eduardo F. Calcines
Hennepin County Library audiobook 5 discs
read by the author
genre: non-fiction memoir, history

Wow! This was so good I'm thinking of buying a personal copy. Calcines tells his personal story from childhood memories prior to the revolution through leaving Cuba at age 14. Powerful, personal narrative from a boy whose family didn't buy in to Castro's revolution. I want to share this with my sister Ann, who visited Cuba in December. I want to share it with Louie's Aunt Cathy and ask her about leaving Cuba. I want to contact the author and thank him for writing this. It's that good!

I will need to see if I can find other things he's written. One of my favorite parts is when his aunt sends a stick of gum from America and he gives half to his little sister who has never tasted gum, then splits the other half with his buddies. It was painful to hear his descriptions of how some of his teachers belittled and ridiculed him for being from a family of dissenters. I loved this book!

From Amazon.com:

Eduardo F. Calcines was a child of Fidel Castro's Cuba; he was just three years old when Castro came to power in January 1959. After that, everything changed for his family and his country. When he was ten, his family applied for an exit visa to emigrate to America and he was ridiculed by his schoolmates and even his teachers for being a traitor to his country. But even worse, his father was sent to an agricultural reform camp to do hard labor as punishment for daring to want to leave Cuba. During the years to come, as he grew up in Glorytown, a neighborhood in the city of Cienfuegos, Eduardo hoped with all his might that their exit visa would be granted before he turned fifteen, the age at which he would be drafted into the army.
In this absorbing memoir, by turns humorous and heartbreaking, Eduardo Calcines recounts his boyhood and chronicles the conditions that led him to wish above all else to leave behind his beloved extended family and his home for a chance at a better future.



I bought the audiobook a while back and shared it with a few people. I re-listened recently and have these notes to add:

• 6110 San Carlos Street in Cienfuegos, Cuba, does not look like his grandparents' home . . . but online maps of Cuba do not have excellent detail. I couldn't find the Hawa(?) Movie House.
• It looks as though he's also written children's books (Rooftop Clubhouse) and is at work on a sequel to this. Titled  The Salmon Run, it will deal with his coming of age in America story. I look forward to reading it!
• I would love to find out if he has been able to return to Cuba for a visit.
• His wife's name is Mercy. I love that!
• He is a Christian. I love that even more! It makes me think of the impact his abuelo had on him.