Rating: 
Summary: Doesn't anyone edit Hunter's books?
Review: I deeply regret spending $26 on such a trite story. All the raw material was there--Swagger, the Russians, the CIA, Castro, Havana--but, this time, Hunter didn't have the interest or energy to meld it into a real novel. Havana is a comic book.
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Summary: Caricatures Instead of Characters
Review: I have only recently discovered the work of Stephen Hunter. I was impressed with two earlier novels of his, Black Light and Pale Horse Coming.I am disappointed with Havana. Here the characters have become caricatures. At times I felt almost like I was reading a comic strip rather than a novel. Dick Tracy meets Batman. Frankie the New York mob guy seems particularly outlandish. Minor characters at their moment of crisis are regularly required to foul themselves. Some of the description seems off. On p. 127 we find, "pink shapes indicating the presence... of pelicans." Pink pelicans in Cuba? Is this some kind of communist pelican? Or has Hunter confused pelicans with flamingos? Then on p. 135 we find Earl Swagger offering the following philosophical tidbit in the midst of a horrendous machine gun shootout, "Well, in cases like this, teamwork is the best thing." It doesn't sound authentic. Despite these problems, Havana is still a good read. There are some compelling parts with great action and credibility. Yet overall I find this a very uneven performance for a writer who is capable of much better work.
Rating: 
Summary: Not His Best
Review: While this book is worth the read it is not as good as his other works. It starts well and ends well but the middle really lags. If you want a good Hunter book read "Point of Impact".
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Summary: This is what I think!
Review: This book is not even literature unless you are a NRA freak! I was expecting an historical novel with regards to the political situation in Cuba during the early 1950's as it related to CIA involvement and activities in the country. Instead, it was a preposterious shootout with improbable situations involving a bunch of sadistic gun slingers and torturers. I can't imagine the author sitting in front of the word processer trying to figure out the most bloody and disgusting murder and torture scenes possible. And then we're treated to pages of gun descripitions and operations - it reads like the old Field and Stream magazine. I'm interested in good literature and not junk like this. The author has a long way to go to publish an historical novel as distinctive as "The Quiet American". Save your money for Field and Stream!
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Summary: Hunter bites off more than he can chew
Review: This is the third in a series of Earl Swagger novels. In Hot Springs, Swagger battles crime bosses in a action packed thriller in which 1940's Hot Springs came alive. It Pale Horse Coming, Swagger battles evil prison guards and brings justice to many long suffering people. In Havana, I'm not really sure what happens. In Havana, Swagger is sent to Cuba to safeguard a congressman who is taking a trip their. In reality, the CIA wants Swagger to kill Castro. But then there are other story lines: the communist sniper, the mafia hitman Frankie, the Cuban secret policeman, and the mafia. Havana felt like a puzzle that was thrown together haphazardly. Early in the book, each short chapter is dedicated to a different story line, and for the longest time, none of the stories are connected. Its hard to get into a book when you have to start from scratch with each chapter like you are reading a new book. Another problem with Havana is that the stories are somewhat related, but not all. Usually in a novel, all story lines will meld into one coherent story, but here you have the hitman with the Cubans, the Russian with Swagger, the CIA in the mix. Too much is going on. Hunter does do a great job of bringing pre-Castro Cuba alive, and that alone was worth reading the novel for. My final complaint is: who is the bad guy. In the last 2 Swagger novels, he clearly knows who is evil and he takes care of them with ease. In Havana, every reader will know that Castro survives, yet 2/3 of the novel is spent chasing after Castro. Only at the end of the novel does a new enemy appear and by then, I don't hate them enough to care for Swagger to kill them. Also, I question Swagger's motives for killing them when it appeared to me there were more evil characters who deserved killing.
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Summary: Down side to pre-quels
Review: My major problem with this book is that it ultimately paints a very nasty and all too true picture of our government. To begin with we know before we even get started that Earl Swagger will be dead within a year of the end of the story.
We've known this since the first book about him, but it has become very dark and murky. A Southern Congressmen went to some murky figures in the intelligence community to have Earl murdered before he can discover that the senator's son and future vice presidential hopeful. What he did not know was that the CIA wanted him dead already and the congressman had only become a lifelong pawn to them,
It's just too much like real life. I read for pleasure but there is no pleasure in having the fact that the scumbags win out in real life, not the good guys.
For those of us who've seen the fact that the politicians ignore intelligence in favor of popular answers and who see that the only things that the CIA has probably suceeded in was the murder of one president, his brother, a civil rights leader and the end of a splinter group southern democrat's attempts to unseat Richard M. Nixon, it's just plain depressing.
Rating: 
Summary: A Different Kind of Earl Swagger Story
Review: If, like me, you've been following the Swaggers, father and son, then you have been eagerly awaiting HAVANA. I couldn't wait to set eyes on pages, because I have to admit that I like the way Stephen Hunter serves up his violence. Straight forward and justly deserved. The Swaggers are no nonsense guys who are firmly rooted with a morel code that brooks no nonsense. Mess with them and bad things happen to you. I grabbed a Carib (Caribbean beer), pretzels and a cigar, then went out on my girlfriend's patio to wile away a Sunday with old friend Earl. However before I'd finished the first page I knew I was delving into a different kind of Earl Swagger story. At first the book seemed kind of choppy, jumping between a botched mob hit in New York, a Siberian gulag, a tennis court in Cuba and Swagger's home in Arkansas. And the characters seemed to be more defined. I read slowly, wondering what was happening, what was Hunter doing to me. But by the time Earl got to Cuba I'd been sucked deep into the story and was reveling in the kooky and kinky characters. There is absolutely no other living author that could have made me buy into the Russian hit man Speshnev, or the stupid, idiotic Castro pictured in the novel, but Hunter makes you believe. And even though Earl shares more of the pages with others than in past Swagger stories, I didn't mind, because when we got Earl, we got the guy we know and love. Hunter may be evolving, but thankfully, Earl is still Earl and HAVANA, though different, is I believe, the best Swagger story yet. Jack Priest, Writer from the Darkside
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Summary: A Worthy Addition to the Swagger Legacy
Review: It's 1953 and Earl Swagger, now a sergeant in the Arkansas State Police, is persuaded to hire on as a bodyguard for Congressman "Boss" Harry Etheridge on a visit to Cuba, but unknown to him he is being lured to the island to assassinate the young and troublesome Fidel Castro, who is going about making speeches about Cuba for Cubans. This is bad for the CIA, the Mafia, Big Sugar and Big Rum, all who want to maintain the status quo. The Russians decide to send a man to cozy up to Fidel, to give the young man advice, to teach him and to protect him. And the Castro painted in this story, a guy who never baths, who smells, who is referred to as "Greaseball," who flies of the handle, who is impulsive and stupid to boot, needs all the advice and protection he can get. Speshnev, Castro's Russian advisor, was pulled from an Artic Gulag for the job. He's a battle hardened veteran of Germany and Spain, but he's also an ironic wisecracker who goes his own way, lives by his own code, much like Swagger. And Earl, in addition to pulling the Congressman's fat out of the fire over a misunderstanding with a lady of the evening, also defends a woman against a drunken Earnest Hemingway, has a gunfight in a porno theater and has to deal with a deadly scalpel wielding torturer. It seems to me that Mr. Hunter has written an espionage novel ala the kind I used to read thirty years ago, only he's taken the genre to a whole 'nother level. HAVANA is a terrific book, a great story and a worthy addition to the Swagger legacy. Ken Douglas, Underpaid Writer
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Summary: Earl Swagger is Back, Better than Ever
Review: Cuba in 1953 is wide open, appealing to rich Americans who want to revel in wine, women and gambling. The Mob, the CIA and Big Sugar want it to stay that way. Castro and the Soviets want change. Earl Swagger has been brought to the country under false pretenses. He thinks he's there to bodyguard a congressman, but the CIA puts him on the hunt for Castro's head. The Russians however have their own version of Swagger, a guy fresh out of a Siberian gulag named Speshnev who've they've sent to nurture, train and protect Fidel and the relationship that develops between the two old soldiers, Swagger and Speshnev is the best part of the story. Assassins, spies, slovenly soldiers, an evil torturer, Meyer Lansky, Ernest Hemingway, and a crazy, stupid mob killer are just a sampling of the characters that people the pages of HAVANA, which is a five star thriller, espionage novel that you won't be able to put down. Reviewed by Vesta Irene
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Summary: Gambling is Expensive, Sex is Cheap, Death is Free
Review: Earl Swagger is on special assignment from the Arkansas state patrol, serving as a bodyguard to Congressman Harry Etheridge, called Boss Harry among his constituents, on the legislator's tour of 1953 Cuba. However, unknown to Earl, the real reason he was asked to guard Boss Harry is because certain elements of the U.S. Government want him to take out Castro, because the fiery young upstart's speeches are inciting the populace and the United Fruit Company, Domino Sugar and American mobsters like things just the way they are, as they're all making mucho moola hand over fist. But the Soviets are just as eager to protect Castro as the Americans are to eliminate him and Earl gets caught in the middle, suffering betrayal after betrayal until he finally takes matters into his own hands, Swagger style. HAVANA'S cast includes a few real-life characters such as Mafioso Meyer Lansky and a loutish Ernest Hemingway and an assortment of unforgettable fictional characters, such as the man from the gulag, the ironic Speshnev, sent to protect Castro. Then there's the Cuban scalpel wielding torturer, who proves to be Swagger's ultimate adversary. I have to say in 1953 Cuba where "gambling is expensive, sex is cheap, and death is free," that there was apparently an awful lot of violence going on and much of it is delivered by Earl Swagger in this book. Review by Stephanie Sane
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