Havana (2003) by Stephen Hunter is a
gritty, bloody tale of tremendous power and satisfaction set in Cuba 1953, a
world of vice, gambling, sex and drugs just thirty minutes by air from Miami. The
Mafia runs the casinos and Meyer Lansky, the mob’s leader in Cuba, vies with
the CIA and American business interests to control the Batista regime and keep
the river of cash flowing. Into the cauldron steps Earl Swagger, the
protagonist of three previous 1950s-set Earl Swagger novels.
This time the
ex-Marine Medal of Honor winner and legendary gunfighter is called in by the
American government to serve as a bodyguard to Congressman Harry Etheridge in
his investigations of New York-gangster activity at the American naval base in
Cuba. The congressman is more interested in exploring the city’s culture of
vice and Swagger is reluctantly drawn into a complicated plot to kill
self-centered, failed baseball star Fidel Castro, intent on wresting power from
the corrupt government and returning it to the people. But Swagger thwarts
backstabbing countrymen, the mob and even the Russians in this excellent
addition to the series.
Review by Peter Critchley of the Vernon Branch
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