Cuba Straits (Doc Ford Series #22)

by Randy Wayne White

Overview

A remarkable installment in the Doc Ford series from New York Times–bestselling author Randy Wayne White.
 
Doc Ford’s old friend General Juan Rivera has gone into the business of high-profile collectibles, but when he manages to obtain a collection of letters written by Fidel Castro between 1960 and 1962 to a secret girlfriend, it’s not a matter of money anymore. Rivera has stumbled way out of his depth. Those letters contain a secret that someone cannot allow to be made public. A lot happened between Cuba and the United States in those years. Many men died. A few more will hardly be noticed.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780594710219
Publisher:	Penguin Publishing Group
Publication date:	03/24/2015
Series:	Doc Ford Series , #22
Pages:	336
Product dimensions:	6.20(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.30(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Randy Wayne White is the author of twenty-two Doc Ford books, including the latest, Deep Blue. He has also had four collections of his columns for Outside magazine and elsewhere published—and the new Hannah Smith series has debuted with Gone, Deceived, and Haunted. In 2002, a one-hour documentary film called The Gift of the Game, about White’s trip to Cuba to find the remnants of the Little League teams founded by Ernest Hemingway in the days before Castro, won the Best of the Fest Award from the 2002 Woods Hole Film Festival, then was bought by PBS and broadcast station by station in the spring and summer of 2003. A veteran fishing guide who at one time had his own local PBS show, he lives in an old house on an Indian mound in Pineland, Florida.

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Excerpted from "Cuba Straits"
by .
Copyright © 2016 Randy Wayne White.
Excerpted by permission of Penguin Publishing Group.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

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What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

Praise for BONE DEEP
 
“White keeps the action churning forward as Doc encounters both human and animal foes, but the real interest here is the archaeological backdrop. Masterfully seeding the plot with information on Florida’s ancient natural history—and its contemporary environmental challenges—White delivers a novel that perfectly blends story and landscape. We often say that fine nonfiction has the narrative drive of a good thriller, but we rarely have occasion to say that a fine thriller has all the mind-boggling fascination of compelling nonfiction.”––Booklist (starred review)
 
“A descent into the world of overzealous and unethical fossil collectors leads to a boat-napping, stolen artifacts, and increasingly dire threats . . . White does a fine job detailing Florida’s unique history and geography.”––Publishers Weekly

Praise for NIGHT MOVES
 
“Fans will still be riveted by Ford and Hannah’s tango-like mating dance. And the climax is a corker, too.  Over his last several Doc Ford novels, White has vaulted to mainstream bestseller status. This one is likely to maintain the pattern.”—Booklist
 
“Captivating . . . [an] intriguing installment.”—Publishers Weekly
 
“White weaves in and out of the two mysteries — the murder attempt and Flight 19 — telling the story with the same tight, vivid prose his fans have come to expect. The result is another strong addition to one of crime fiction’s most consistent series.”—Associated Press
 
“Drawing on his usual mix of science, ecology and Florida lore, White reels in an exciting story in "Night Moves” . . . [the novel] illustrates why, after 20 novels, Ford's double life and White's attention to the Florida scenery continue to intrigue readers.”—South Florida Sun-Sentinel

Editorial Reviews

01/19/2015
Present-day Cuba is the setting of bestseller White’s timely 22nd Doc Ford thriller (after 2014’s Bone Deep). The former dictator of Masagua, “a tiny country that exported bananas and revolution,” turns to Ford for help after he temporarily “loses” Figueroa Casanova, a Cuban baseball player he smuggled into the U.S. Casanova wandered off from his St. Petersburg, Fla., motel, carrying a briefcase full of letters written by Fidel Castro to the dictator’s mistress from 1953 to 1963. Ford’s unpredictable sidekick, Tomlinson, manages to locate Casanova and decides to return him and the Castro letters to Cuba. When Ford learns that a Russian spy, among others, is after the letters, he heads to Cuba to find Tomlinson. More than one distraction diverts Ford from his mission, including investigating the legend that three American ballplayers buried their new motorcycles in Cuba the day Castro took power. White smoothly combines history, action, and colorful characters into a savory concoction easily devoured in a single sitting. Agent: Esther Newberg, ICM. (Mar.)

Publishers Weekly

Praise for Randy Wayne White’s Cuba Straits

“White shows a new side to his talent [in Cuba Straits], combining familiar themes and much-loved characters with a real flair for madcap adventure.” —Booklist (starred review)
 
“White smoothly combines history, action, and colorful characters into a savory concoction easily devoured in a single sitting.” —Publishers Weekly
 
“A trove of revealing private documents, rumors concerning a political assassination, a trip to Cuba—it’s either today’s newspaper or Dr. Marion Ford’s 22nd adventure. . . . Cuba provides the perfect setting. . . . The next few months’ headlines will determine whether his view of contemporary Cuba is remarkably prophetic.” —Kirkus Reviews
 
“Baseball, fishing, sharp dialogue, and an action-packed story. Pour a mojito, think of a place where people clap ‘just because the sun goes down,’ and read this.” —Cleveland Plain Dealer
 
“Intriguing settings, colorful characters, and eye-opening geopolitical dramas. When you mix everything together, you have a ready-to-serve and highly recommended first-class adventure.” —Mystery Scene
 
“White’s storytelling at its best…a rip-roaring plot filled with baseball, history, lost treasure, and, just for good measure, a love triangle—all wrapped in politics.” —South Florida Sun-Sentinel
 
“The master has knocked one out of the park.” —The Florida Times-Union

From the Publisher

10/15/2014
Bad news for Doc Ford. His old friend Gen. Juan Garcia, who now specializes in selling high-profile collectibles, has vanished after selling a cache of letters Fidel Castro wrote to a secret girlfriend in the early Sixties. And the buyer can't be found, either. What was in those letters?

Library Journal

2015-01-07
A trove of revealing private documents, rumors concerning a political assassination, a trip to Cuba—it's either today's newspaper or Dr. Marion Ford's 22nd adventure.Even before the embargo is lifted, it's not all that hard to get Americans to travel to Cuba. Just ask Doc Ford, who agrees to go there to hunt for a missing shortstop and the briefcase he took from Ford's old frenemy Gen. Juan Simón Rivera. Doc's willing to chase after Figueroa Casanova even though he knows he's involved in something illegal—Rivera's long-running business smuggling Cuban ballplayers into the U.S.—partly because the trip offers the possibility of spotting one of the Pacific Ridley turtles native to the island. And the search is quickly successful, more or less. Ford and Sighurdhr Tomlinson find Casanova early on, but the two old friends get separated shortly thereafter, Tomlinson ending up with Figgy, Ford with the briefcase, which turns out to contain hundreds of personal letters Fidel and Raul Castro wrote to the same woman over a pivotal period in Cuba's turbulent history. Will the truth about the 1959 revolution, the Bay of Pigs invasion and the killing of JFK come to light? Not if sadistic Santeria priest Vernum Quick and his Russian handler, Anatol Kostikov, have anything to say about it. Luckily, Ford finds an unexpected ally in Sabina Estéban, whose mother sent her and her sister, Maribel, on a boat to Florida after Maribel, 13, witnessed a murder and worse. Sabina may be only 10, but she's the most resourceful little spitfire you can imagine. Cuba provides the perfect setting for White's recent fondness for episodic, hallucinatory quests (Bone Deep, 2014). The next few months' headlines will determine whether his view of contemporary Cuba is remarkably prophetic or yesterday's news.

Kirkus Reviews

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