Last Seen in Havana

September 1, 2023

Newly widowed baker Mercedes Spivey returns to her native Cuba from Miami to care for an ailing grandparent with a second goal in mind: to discover what happened to her mother, who disappeared when Mercedes was a child. Paralleling Mercedes's search is the story of her mother, a U.S. college student who fell in love with a Cuban soldier on a trip to the island and decided to stay. From the Herralde-winning Cuban American author. Prepub Alert.

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Starred review from December 4, 2023
Mercedes Spivey is haunted by images of her long-departed mother, Tania, in this bighearted entry in Dovalpage’s Havana Series (after Death Under the Perseids). As a child in her native Cuba, Mercedes felt abandoned by Tania, who disappeared under mysterious circumstances when Mercedes was very young. A short time later, her father was deployed to Angola to fight in that country’s civil war and killed, leaving Mercedes to be raised by her paternal grandmother. Now living in Miami, Mercedes returns to Havana to care for her grandmother in the crumbling villa where her family once lived. The return to Cuba revives Mercedes’s interest in resolving her mother’s disappearance, and as she follows the little evidence available to her, she begins to wonder if her mom might still be alive. Told in chapters that alternate between Mercedes’s perspective in the present day and Tania’s in the early 1980s, the novel adroitly juxtaposes Mercedes’s unwavering devotion to finding the truth with Tania’s slow slide from idealism to disillusionment as Castro’s socialist regime falls short of its promises. Armchair travelers will savor Dovalpage’s detailed depiction of Cuba, and the heartbreaking ending will stay with readers long after they turn the last page. Dovalpage delivers the goods.

December 1, 2023
In the follow-up to the delightfully creepy Death under the Perseids (2021), Dovalpage offers readers a terrific domestic suspense novel, the fourth in the Havana Mystery series. The plot motor is a good one: Cuban-born U.S. resident Mercedes visits Havana to care for her sick grandmother and solve the mystery of her mother's disappearance when Mercedes was very young. As far as she knows, her father, Joaquin, died an honorable death in the war with Angola. But once she starts investigating, she learns that her father supposedly died in combat in 1991, and the Angola war ended in 1988. The mystery deepens as Mercedes goes about everyday life: dinner, shopping, family gatherings, picking out clothes, seeing friends, domestic squabbles, caring for children, domestic dissatisfaction. Mercedes' story is told in parallel with that of a young woman visiting Havana and falling in love three decades earlier. Recommend this to fans of Mary Kubica and Kristin Kisska. All can enjoy the fine writing, along with finally learning what happened to Mercedes' parents.

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January 1, 2024
A novel told in alternating narratives of one woman searching for an explanation for her mother's disappearance and another adjusting to life in 1980s Cuba. Mercedes Spivey, a professional baker who's recently been widowed, flies from Miami to Cuba in 2019 to take care of her ailing grandmother. Mamina has been the primary parental figure in Mercedes' life ever since her American mother, whose name she doesn't know, disappeared when she was a toddler and her Cuban father, Joaqu�n Montero, died in combat in Angola. Mercedes is determined to make sure that Mamina's in the best health she can be and that their family's beautiful but fragile Art Deco home, Villa Santa Marta, can make it through hurricane season. Interspersed with Mercedes' story are chapters set in the 1980s that follow a free-spirited woman named Sarah as she leaves San Diego for an impulsive trip to Cuba in an attempt to get away from her parents, who try to control her every move. Falling in love with Cuban soldier Joaqu�n Montero convinces her to stay in Havana and make the island her own. As Mercedes begins sorting through childhood memories with Mamina, Sarah makes a home with Joaqu�n, all the while learning about Cuban culture and customs, from the language to the rations. Unspooling limited information from Mamina, Mercedes continues to wonder if it's worth searching for her mother, or if the woman's long absence means that she's dead. Interest in the past supersedes interest in the present until the ending inevitably wraps things up the only way possible.

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