Some love stories survive distance and war, while others wait more than fifty years to be discovered.
In the summer of 2021, twenty-four-year-old Lena Pérez is struggling with the end of a three-year relationship when she discovers a box of letters her grandfather has kept hidden for more than half a century.
The letters belong to another time-and reveal a grandfather Lena has never known.
Long before he became the quiet, stubborn man she calls Grandpa, Rolando Pérez was a young Cuban exile in love with Maylin, the woman he left behind. Separated by revolution, an ocean, and eventually the Vietnam War, they cling to each other through letters filled with longing, hope, and dreams of the life they believe they will someday share.
But as Lena reads deeper into their correspondence, a different story begins to emerge.
There are missing letters. Years that remain unexplained. And secrets her grandfather has spent a lifetime trying to forget.
Against the backdrop of a Cuba transformed by revolution and an America divided by war, Lena follows the lives of two young people separated by history-and begins to question the choices that have shaped her own life.
Because sometimes the past doesn't stay buried, and an old love story can change the way we understand our own.
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"In her newest novel, award-winning author Betty Viamontes uses the first-person narrative and brilliantly exploits the epistolary approach. As in her prior works, she continues to describe life in Cuba.
The novel is set in present day and is full of surprises that will keep you guessing what will happen next." -Susana Jiménez-Mueller, storyteller and podcaster, author of Now I Swim and The Green Plantain - The Cuban Stories Project podcast. About the Author
>Her stories have traveled the world from the award-winning Waiting on Zapote Street to the No. 1 newest releases, The Pedro Pan Girls and The Girl from White Creek. Betty Viamontes was born in Havana, Cuba, and immigrated to the United States with her family as a teenager. She is the author of more than twenty books, several of them award-winning, and draws inspiration from her Cuban heritage and family history to tell stories of love, resilience, and the immigrant experience. OTHER TITLES BY BETTY VIAMONTESWaiting on Zapote Street: Love and Loss in Castro's Cuba
Candela's Secrets and Other Havana Stories
The Girl from White Creek
Havana: A Son's Journey Home
The Dance of the Rose
Under the Palm Trees: Surviving Labor Camps in Cuba
The Pedro Pan Girls: Seeking Closure
Brothers: A Pedro Pan Story
Flight of the Tocororo
A Girl Named Polina
Crossing North: Tribulations of a Cuban Doctor
Between Heaven and Sea: The Story of the Cuban Rafter
Orchids in the Shadows: Between Darkness and Light in Cuba
Raining Over Teresa: From Mother to Hero
After They Left
Memoirs of a Pianist: The Extraordinary Story of a Cuban Prodigy