The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love

Rating:
Summary: The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love
Review: "The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love" is a book that has really made me ask myself who and what I want to be as a person. This book is about two young latino brothers, Cesar and Nestor Castillo who have come from Cuba to the United States to persue a dream of playing their Mambo music and to entertain people. This book does a great job of showing the ups and downs of the brothers personal lives and the their lives as musicans. The book does a fair job describing the the Castillo family as a whole. You just Don't hear much about Cesar and Nestors immediate family down in Cuba, which I thought was somewhat disappointing because I really think this could have answered a lot of questions that I asked myself through this book, like why was Nestor so hung up on one girl or why sex is so important to Cesar. This book was very decriptive in many of the sexual encounters the brother had espescially Cesar's. Through out this book the question of family and what it means to the brothers is somthing that I asked myself. Wether it was boyfriend and girlfriend, mother and father, or parents and childeren, I have had mixed feelings on how family members had been treated. Thinking about the lives the brothers lead of drinking, womeninzing, and having horrific diets I would have to say, besides the "I love Lucy Show" their lives have been disappointing. Cesar never learns the true meaning of love and respect throughout his life. The words weak and helpless desribe Cesar Castillo perfectly.

Rating:
Summary: The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love
Review: "The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love" is a book that has really made me ask myself who and what I want to be as a person. This book is about two young latino brothers, Cesar and Nestor Castillo who have come from Cuba to the United States to persue a dream of playing their Mambo music and to entertain people. This book does a great job of showing the ups and downs of the brothers personal lives and the their lives as musicans. The book does a fair job describing the the Castillo family as a whole. You just Don't hear much about Cesar and Nestors immediate family down in Cuba, which I thought was somewhat disappointing because I really think this could have answered a lot of questions that I asked myself through this book, like why was Nestor so hung up on one girl or why sex is so important to Cesar. This book was very decriptive in many of the sexual encounters the brother had espescially Cesar's. Through out this book the question of family and what it means to the brothers is somthing that I asked myself. Wether it was boyfriend and girlfriend, mother and father, or parents and childeren, I have had mixed feelings on how family members had been treated. Thinking about the lives the brothers lead of drinking, womeninzing, and having horrific diets I would have to say, besides the "I love Lucy Show" their lives have been disappointing. Cesar never learns the true meaning of love and respect throughout his life. The words weak and helpless desribe Cesar Castillo perfectly.

Rating:
Summary: Wow
Review: After I read this book, I immediately read all of Hijuelos' other books; this one remains the best of them all. It is absolutely riveting, spell-binding, fascinating, entertaining, and VERY erotic (be warned about that if that sort of thing is not for you because it's intense and extremely descriptive, also beautiful, and some of the best erotic text I've ever read). This book is as rythmic and melodious as the music from which it draws its inspiration. If I could do it over, I almost wouldn't read this book first, because to me the rest of Hijuelos' are a bit of a let-down in comparison, and patterns in his themes begin to become apparent that make them less enjoyable (although reading it first is a good thing for not knowing about the patterns)....Great Book!

Rating:
Summary: Wow
Review: After I read this book, I immediately read all of Hijuelos' other books; this one remains the best of them all. It is absolutely riveting, spell-binding, fascinating, entertaining, and VERY erotic (be warned about that if that sort of thing is not for you because it's intense and extremely descriptive, also beautiful, and some of the best erotic text I've ever read). This book is as rythmic and melodious as the music from which it draws its inspiration. If I could do it over, I almost wouldn't read this book first, because to me the rest of Hijuelos' are a bit of a let-down in comparison, and patterns in his themes begin to become apparent that make them less enjoyable (although reading it first is a good thing for not knowing about the patterns)....Great Book!

Rating:
Summary: Fire and water
Review: Anybody coming out of this book disappointed is missing the point completely--the Pulitzer Prize may be highly sought after in literary circles, but it's not the 'Holy Grail'. Oscar Hijuelos sets out to create a mood, a feel, as much as a story, and to that end, he totally succeeds.

Very few books have taken me to places and kept me there throughout. His dialogue is sharp as well as colourful; his characters, exxagerated but no less memorable, and his (use of) flowing stream of consciousness as a writing style works well for the most part.

If you have passion, you'll really enjoy this book. If you're from the mid-west, it's just another log on the fire.

Rating:
Summary: Fire and water
Review: Anybody coming out of this book disappointed is missing the point completely--the Pulitzer Prize may be highly sought after in literary circles, but it's not the 'Holy Grail'. Oscar Hijuelos sets out to create a mood, a feel, as much as a story, and to that end, he totally succeeds.

Very few books have taken me to places and kept me there throughout. His dialogue is sharp as well as colourful; his characters, exxagerated but no less memorable, and his (use of) flowing stream of consciousness as a writing style works well for the most part.

If you have passion, you'll really enjoy this book. If you're from the mid-west, it's just another log on the fire.

Rating:
Summary: A novel of torrid lushness and depth
Review: Despite numerous spelling and grammatical errors in the Perennial Classics edition, The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love is a novel of plucky inventiveness where the "post-modernist, non-linear style" and language lucidly conveys the wants that people -- men especially -- have: the longing for prosperity and achievement, the craving to feel good-looking, comely, the shaking off of a placid guise and to behave wildly, amorously as well as to let the inner appetite of what man wants to contribute to society manifest itself, make it palpable so people in the vacinity mutter to themselves, "I want to do that." Causing people to feel the pleasure and joy that is in one's mind and heart is the kernel of this book.

In this novel, we are introduced to two Cuban brothers, Cesar and Nestor Castillo, both musicians from Havana. One is outgoing and unreserved while the other is cogitative and solemn. As dreamers and immigrants, they hunger to make it is musicians, for that is where the good times are: women, alcohol, food, dancing and recognition. When they reach that peak, from blue-collar workers by day to saucy musicians by night, is the American dream as fulfilling as it was once thought to be? Or is there something in the essence of spirituality or love that can close the vacuous hole that plagues man's heart? Whatever you, as a reader conclude, there is no denying that the novel is brimming with vibrancy and life. A shimmering hue of ideals, culture and language make this book almost impossible to put down, despite the overlooked errors made by Perennial. Though sometimes graphic in its sexual candor and explicitness, the gratuitousness of the sex is what makes the "true love" theme so vitally important.

To quote The New Yorker review/blurb in the book jacket: "The story is so utterly American that it's a wonder we haven't heard this particular version of it before, and a credit to Mr. Hijuelos that we're hearing it now..." To the Amazon.com reviewer who said that Perennial published the book as though they didn't care and that they should apologize, I concur.

Rating:
Summary: Man, The Mambo Kings Can Play, and Boy , Can Hijuelos Write
Review: I bought this book when it first came out in paperback (I believe that was in 1990), and when I took it to the counter to pay for it, the young woman said, with a look of awe on her face, "Oh, what a wonderful book." I couldn't agree more with that bookstore clerk. This is the first book I read by Hijuelos, and as soon as I finished it, I went and got Hijuelos's first novel, "Our House in the Last World," and loved it every bit as much as "Mambo Kings." I've read Hijuelos's three novels that followed "Mambo Kings," and while they were all OK (this is a talented writer) they were not as good as his first two.

Oh, I almost forgot. About a year after I read "Mambo Kings," I lent it to a woman -- a very bright woman -- but, unlike me, she's just not much of a reader. She also loved this book.

I'm a female. The two aforementioned people are females. Unlike many of the previous reviewers, not one of us was one iota offended by the book's sexuality. Everything in the book rang true, and that's what counts.

My tastes change. I'm not so sure I would love this book now as much as I did about a dozen years ago. But that doesn't matter --my memory of how much I loved it back then is all that matters.

Rating:
Summary: Keep An Open Mind
Review: I read this book, for the first time, for a college American Literature course about seven years ago. The teacher warned everyone in advance that it "may appear to be a bit too descriptive, too sexual but to please keep an open mind" because this was an integral part of the book. He was right. I found this book to be fascinating, sensual and written clearly enough that I felt as though I was a character on the sidelines, watching these two brothers go through their lives. To the readers who found this degrading to women, try to realize that these were lovers in the true definition. They were Cuban men who absolutely adored women; they appreciated the beauty of all women and showed it in the most physical sense possible. As a woman, I found the book to be truly sensual and enjoyable. Since reading this book I have made a point to read all of Hijuelos' books and, every year or two, I pick up "Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love" to go back to that time of raw sensuality that Hijuelos describes so well.

My teacher was right. Keep an open mind while reading this, or any, book. But, don't deny yourself the luxury of reading such a wonderful book!

Rating:
Summary: Entertaining enough but lacking in literary qualities
Review: It's not unreasonable to have high expectations of a Pulitzer Prize winning novel. It's also seldom that the movie is better than the book, so it's doubly disappointing that Oscar Hijuelos' much lauded "The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love (MKPSOL)" should prove to be such a shallow, shabby and one dimensional affair. The novel's premise hold much promise - tale of two Cuban brothers who work at a meat packing plant by day but transform into gilded musicians in a band by night - but the execution is surprisingly amateurish. Characterisation is poor - both Cesar and Nestor seem like caricatures (the extrovert/hunk and the introvert/dreamer) rather than rounded or believable characters. We never truly understand their psyche but then we don't really care because we can't relate to them anyway. The graphic sex scenes that litter the novel keep repeating every three pages or so. They are not an affront to good taste - we are not prudes - but cheapen the reading experience. The plot also suffers from a lack of dramatic momentum. The storyline stalls some place midway, becomes quickly boring and repetitive and degenerates into a one note samba. Hijuelos' prose may be straightforward, easy on the eyes, easy on the brains but curiously flat and pulp fiction like. Only the Desi Arnaz episode manages to lift MKPSOL from its low aim by showing the funny side to the American psyche - always ready to be star struck. MKPSOL makes for a light entertaining (albeit over long) read but it hasn't remotely the literary qualities worthy of its Pulitzer Prize winning status. I can't imagine it surviving as serious literature for the ages. If you want to read a good book by a Cuban or similar writer, go for either Christina Garcia or Julia Alvarez.