HOTEL CUBA: A NOVEL

From the award-winning author of The View from Stalin's Head, a stunning novel about two sheltered Russian Jewish sisters, desperate to get to America to make a new life, who find themselves trapped in the sultry, hedonistic world of 1920s Havana.

Fleeing the chaos of World War I and the terror of the Soviet Revolution, practical, sensible Pearl Kahn and her lovestruck, impulsive younger sibling Frieda sail for America to join their sister in New York. But discriminatory new immigration laws bar their entry, and the young women are turned back at Ellis Island. With few options, Pearl and Frieda head for Havana, Cuba, convinced they will find a way to overcome this setback.

At first, life in big-city Prohibition-era Havana is overwhelming, like nothing Pearl and Frieda have ever experienced—or could have ever imagined in the rural shtetl where they grew up. As the sisters begin to adjust, their plans for going to America together become complicated. Frieda falls for the not-so-dreamy man of her dreams while Pearl’s life opens up unexpectedly, offering her a taste of freedom and heady romance, and an opportunity to build a future on her own terms. Though to do so, she must confront her past and the shame she has long carried.

A heartbreaking, epic family story, Hotel Cuba explores the profound courage of two women displaced from their home who strive to create a new future in an enticing and dangerous world far different from anything they have ever known.

Aaron Hamburger is the author of the story collection The View from Stalin’s Head—which won the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Rome Prize and was nominated for a Violet Quill Award—and two novels, Faith for Beginners, which was nominated for a Lambda Literary Award, and Nirvana Is Here, winner of a Bronze Medal from the Foreword Reviews Indies Book Awards. His writing has appeared in the New York Times; Washington Post; O, The Oprah Magazine; Tablet; The Forward; and numerous other publications. He lives in Washington, DC.

You may order Hotel Cuba: A Novel by Aaron Hamburger from:

• Rakestraw Books in Danville: https://www.rakestrawbooks.com/book/9780063221444
• Orinda Books in Orinda: https://www.orindabooks.com/book/9780063221444
• Mrs. Dalloway's Bookstore in Berkeley: https://www.mrsdalloways.com/book/9780063221444
• Your preferred local bookstore or online retailer

Admission is free. Upon registration, you will first receive a confirmation email. An hour before the program begins, we will email the Zoom link you need to join the event. If you don't see these emails, please check your spam/junk folder to retrieve them. We suggest you add notifications@wixevents.com to your contacts list as well.

Sponsored by CCJCC, Cong. B'nai Shalom and Jewish Book Council in partnership with Diablo Valley Hadassah.