What I like most in  this book is to see first-time novelist Rachel Kushner make her own rules.  That’s what I’ve always heard is best thing to do in any writing workshop I’ve ever participated in – I mean, this is fiction. When it comes down to it, the job of a fiction writer is to just make things up.  Cuba may be located 90 miles south from the tip of Florida, and in 1958, we all know what was happening on the island.   Fidel Castro's army of rebels were in the mountains, prepared and primed  for revolution against what they considered American Imperialism.   They had had enough with being treated as second-class citizens in their own country. Rachel Kushner makes Fidel Castro an important character in her story; she dives behind the scenes of what we read in the history books to give us a Down and Dirty look at Fidel Castro before he became Fidel Castro.  The Americans were worried.  I’m talking about the American investors in the sugar industry threatened by their own labor force, and the American government threatened by communist sympathizers.  It’s well-documented, but the Cuba of Rachel’s novel is her Cuba —  She can do anything she wants with it.

Fidel C. is not the only Down and Dirty character in this book – the novel begins with Fidel C’s rebels burning down the valued American United Fruit sugar cane fields on the island of Cuba.  The sky turns black.  Ashes fell like snow.  Native workers mysteriously disappeared.  There was no one to help extinguish the fire.  The message of this book is clear:  “YANQUIS GO HOME!!”   Rachel Kushner relies on her poetic license to create a very interesting figure in the Cuban Revoltuion.  The name of the character is Rachel K.  Sort of like Franz Kafka’s protagonist Joseph K in the novel The Trial. To look for Rachel K, you will need to go to the Tokio Bar in Havana’s seedy sex district. Rachel K is a “zasou dancer.”  I’m not sure what that is, but she has dark eyes and full lips, and for her dancing numbers, she paints her fishnets directly on her skin with liquid mascara.  She appears to be a Gypsy Jew that has fled religious persecution in Europe.  In Havana, she maintains sexual relationship  with an ex-Waffen mercenary who now works for Fidel C.  That’s just the start of it. I think she sleeps with both the exiled Cuban president Prio and the newly inagurated Cuban president Bautista. She’s like a Spy/Prostitute/Zasou Dancer that peddles information to stay alive.

The story of Telex to Cuba is narrated by two rich and priveledged American teenagers. These two happen to be the children of a rich and ambitious American United Fruit executive who is tasked with keeping the sugar cutting and the money flowing. The family lives in a closely guarded/protected community estate where the only Cubans to be seen work as servants.  I know.  I know that Rachel must have heard criticisms for the perspective of her narrators.  I mean what are they going to know about revolutionary politics. They are both young and naive. I like red-headed Emily, for she is very observant. She reminds me of Scout from To Kill a Mockingbird. She’s like the moral compass of the novel.   From the beginning, racial lines are clearly drawn.  The White People are there to run things on the island.  The Cubans are there for their whim and disposal.  Emily is not that pretty,  but she makes up for it with the respect and dignity she shows for the less-priveledged on the island.   Her first love is a Hatian servant learns English by reading discarded fashion magazines.   This may be a Good Move on the author’s part.  This gives her the chance to integrate multiple perspctives into her narrative.  Emily, who is coming-of-age, sees things one way.  Her future is nothing but HOPE.  Rachel K, who has been around the block, sees things entirely different.  She can’t see beyond tomorrow.  Together, these two touch us in  different ways.

I’m with the author – Rachel Kushner –  when she draws the real Ernest Hemingway into her story.  It’s only fair.  His  presence was huge on the island in 1958.  Somewhere near the halfway point in the novel, Rachel sits Ernie down at Floridita bar next to one of her principle characters, an ex-Nazi colonel refugee,  What and odd couple they make.  Of course Ernie is hammered.  From what I read, he wakes up every morning at 6:00 and works his ass off until noon.  That’s his system: to lay it down – his word total – and then leave it behind him until the next day.  This is when he begins drinking.  He once said, “I have spent all my life drinking, but since writing is my ture love I never get the two mixed up.”

Jaja.  Rachel paints a scene where the ex-Nazi walks into the famous Floridita bar.   The guy’s name is Christien de la Maziere.  It sound French because it is French.  Christien might be Rachel K if he was a woman.  I say this, for he shows the propensity to jump sides when he needs to.  Apparently when German Army steamrolled through his France, he found his way to the winning side.  He talked himself from being killed to being a killer.    And  wouldn’t you know who he sits down next to in la Floridita?  Our favorite American Author.   In the Wehrmach, Christien learned how to kill, torture, and dispose of bodies.  But inside the Floridita, he is ill-prepared for Hemingway’s drunken behavior.  Hemingway, the macho-man he is, patronizes and lectures the Frenchman sitting next to him.  I’m sure Christien was thinking three things:  He didn’t have any idea who Hemingway was or what he was talking about.  But, could he take out a gun and shoot him on the spot?  Probably not. Christien takes over the narrative when we get tired of Emily and Rachel K.  Another good move by the author.

I think I have found a new favorite author in Rachel Kushner. Right now, I’m reading her second novel The Flamethrowers.  Don’t ask me what it’s about – I’ve only started – but already I think I can see another side of Rachel K.  This time the character is named Reno. Sorry, no one-letter abbreviation for a last name.  Just Reno.  She’s called Reno, because, well, she’s from Reno, Nevada.  In the first chapter, the author has exchanged the fishnet stocking look that Rachel K displayed in Telex for  sweaty leather racing pants that Reno sports in Flamethrowers.  Reno has just graduated from art school and she his headed cross-country for New York City on an Italian motorcycle for inspiration. Immediately, I see a lot of Rachel K in Reno.  Ernie Hemingway often based his fiction on his real-life experience.  In The Sun Also Rises, the main character Jake Barnes eerily reminds us of the author himself.  He drinks, fights, and betrays his closest friends. In this novel, Jake B says, "Everybody behaves badly.  Give them the proper chance."  Rachel Kushner appears to follow his advice.  She makes her own rules.  I like it.