Fallen Angels Sing

Book excerpt: To escape the wrath of a deceived husband, Miguel Saavedra, a poet of sorts, abandons the good-time existential vacuum of MiamiÍs uprooted younger Cubans for New York. There he is caught in a web of plots spun by pro- and anti-Castro agents. The surrealistic flow of days and nights which follow lead the protagonist from university lecture hall to transvestite bar, from the arms of a beautiful woman to the dark regions of a basement santerÕa temple. As the barriers between dream and reality, fact and fiction disappear, the ultimate purpose of MiguelÍs life is unveiled before him: Miguel, like St. Michael, must confront the eternal foe: angels and archangels of evil incarnate. Omar TorresÍ Fallen Angels Sing, an English recreation by the author of his novel Apenas un bolero, is a magnificent tour de force that keeps the reader hanging on by a thread through to its unexpected ending.