Jay Lillie

Those familiar with my 2005 novel, Havana Passage, know that the story takes place in 2009 in the first months of a new U.S. President’s term; Fidel Castro has disappeared from the front pages of the New York Times; and Hugo Chavez is stirring the pot of unrest in the Caribbean. If it sounds familiar, that’s because it is. 

Mark Twain said that the difference between writing fact and creating fiction is that fiction needs to be credible. It’s too much to ask that our real experience over the next six months will track the storyline of Havana Passage, but since I wrote it six years ago it’s stayed on course toward what may happen next spring. If you think what goes on in Havana and Miami next March might be unbelievable, revisit Havana Passage for a short course in foreign intrigue and political Washington. 

My tour promoting Havana Passage took me to Miami several times in 2005, where I talked to a number of Cuban expatriates. Some didn’t like my criticism of the 50 year-old embargo, but wondered after reading the novel where I’d sourced my knowledge of Havana and its people, which they said was remarkably accurate. One of them wrote me to say she enjoyed the read and hoped things would turn out in real life the way they do in my novel. 

It’s hard to budge 50 years of dogmatic adherence to a failed foreign policy like Washington’s embargo against U.S. business going to Cuba. We’ll see what happens as the time and place of Havana Passage plays out for real, and Chavez of Venezuela moves to help the Castro brothers keep the Cuban people from achieving their destiny. 

Mark Twain was right, so hold onto your hats, and take Havana Passage down from the shelf in your library.

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