"Finally together in one volume, the best of the fiercely original and sometimes hilarious stories by one of Cuba's great writers. Nine of them have never before appeared in English." "These stories represent Reinaldo Arenas's entire career: his recently rediscovered debut (which got him a job at the Biblioteca Nacional in Havana), stories smuggled out of Cuba, and some of his last works, written in exile.".

"Here is the tender story of a boy who recognizes evil for the first time and decides to ignore it: the tale of a writer struggling between the demands of creativity and of fame; a portrait of ordinary people dealing with changes brought about by revolution; a romp with a renowned - and dangerous - woman in the Metropolitan Museum and an outrageous fantasy that picks up where Federico Garcia Lorca's famous play The House of Bernarda Alba ends."--BOOK JACKET.