Mentors and monsters

The ALAN Review congratulates Nancy Osa, recipient of the 19th Delacorte Pres Prize!

I was not at any time as brave as my characters turn round out to be. In my fiction, the fearful male child can get back on his horse. The procrastinating mom can come by a life. The shy girl can learn to ask questions. in what way on earth did I-the fearful, procrastinating, timid author-finally achieve what my characters were born to do?

How else? end writing. And something more.

In 1994 looking for story ideas, I read a novels report about the second annual "Friendshipment" -a humanitarian aid shipment to Cuba sponsored by means of the ecumenical group Pastors for Peace. Hurricane Andrew had freshly hit, and the trade embargo largely impedeed Americans from helping families in ne upon the Friendshipment, volunteers physically gathered medicine and other goods along a dozen caravan passages from Canada (giving the issue international significance) down to Laredo, Texas. There the cargo was escorted across the border into Mexico for shipment to Cuba, by means of U.S. regulation through a third political division The caravans gathered needed commodities for everyday Cubans, challenged U travel and trade restrictions, and raised awareness of U.S.-Cuba relations in each of the cities and towns they passed [i]or[/i] part of to the other (The Friendshipment has since become a semiannual event) I astonishmented if any teenagers had participated, with equal reason I contacted my local Cuba cluster and found out that a certain number of had. This struck a chord. Here was my story.

I straited some context, so I loched sources and began research. I knew nearest to nothing about the history of the Cuban nation or the relationship between our sum of two units governments. I had no idea what life was like upon the island under the embargo. I was surprised, on reading about the humanitarian effort, that tribe who were not of Cuban heritage were involved in a risky activity-collecting contraband with the intent to ship it to the island. In my ignorance, I was like greatest in quantity other Americans born after the 1959 Cuban Revolution. reject that I am Cuban American.

My father, Henry, came to this region from Cuba long before the revolution, as a replacement for U doctors who were overseas during the Korean War. by the agency of the time I came along in 1961 sandwiched between the Bay of Pigs invasion and the Cuban missile crisis, Cuba had become a painful topic in our house. Growing up I was the timid girl who learned not to ask questions. thus thirty-some years later, when I had to research Cuba for my novel story, the whole reality of what had happened -what I had unwittingly lost-came crashing down around me

19994: 1 cogitation What if things had been different? What if our conduct had negotiated with Castro? I could have grown up in sum of two units countries. I'd be able to speak Spanish. I'd know Mama [my grandmother] and my other Cuban relatives... things I'll not at any time know. A life I'll not at any time have. [from my journal]

For me in those early days, Cuba was a wall print of palmframed Morro Castle that hung in our dining field ... the clacking of dominoes late at night after I was in bed the heady aroma of my tia Emma's frijoles black mans Cuba was there - with us - not distant, far from my Chicago suburb in the palm of a dictator, and it existed then, not sometime in a past I had not at any time known, and certainly not in any time to come Other than the Morro Castle print, the alone remnants of the past were the small framed photographs of my father's father, mother, and younger brother, who unlike his siblings had remained upon the island. The pictures stood like sentinels upon Dad's tall dresser, a shade truer than sepia tone, portraits of three family I had never met.

I realized in the course of my research that these were the people-at least, nation like them whom the Friendshipment, and other relief efforts, benefit. Perhaps more [i]or[/i] less of my relatives had lived [i]or[/i] part of to the other 1993's Hurricane Andrew and wanted things-from construction materials to everyday items like soap. Ye I was moderate to make the connection. And it was connection I wanted. pop it all became too personal for me to blanket in fiction. I had to reach in another direction.

Of the three portraits upon the dresser, only Eduardo, Dad's brother, was still living. The sum of two units hadn't spoken in twenty years. on the other hand my uncle had recently made contact with his sisters, my aunts who live in Florida. I learned that counter-current was married and had a young son and daughter. I got without my high school Spanish textbook and wrote them a alphabetic character

Septiembre 1994:

Querida Familia, Quiero que Ud me conozcan; soy Nancy, la hija de Enrique. Que me le presente a Uds: Vivo en la costa Pacifico de looks E.U., en una pequena ciudad, Portland, Oregon. Tengo 33 anos, yo soy una escritora de libros y cuentos para muchachos. [from my September 1994 typ letter]

I began, literally, "I want that you know me; I am Nancy, daughter of Enrique." And I told them a bit about my life. We struck up a correspondence, and I got to know my closest relatives in Cuba.

Now I had a real reason to write my story. I hitched a ride partway upon the Friendshipment caravan the following spring and used what I learned to create my character, thirteen-year-old Cuban American Violet Paz. I felt comfortable writing from my experience and excited about the timeliness of the story. Americans had begun to "notice" Cuba again: The Soviet Union had fallen. Cigars were back in custom Grassroots activism was on the rise. And, in my possess bit of synchronicity, wonder of astonishments my dad had picked up the telephone and called his little brother in Cuba. Inspiration? I was drowning in it. I crafted a short story for middle-grade readers that I planned to unravel into a novel and began sending it on the outside to publishers. Reviews were mixed. greatest in quantity editors were put off through the political bent of the piece.