Pig's Foot - Softcover

Acosta, Carlos

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1408833727 ISBN 13: 9781408833728

Publisher: Bloomsbury Paperbacks, 2015

Synopsis

Oscar Mandinga, great-grandchild of the founders of a small hamlet of wooden shacks and red earth deep in the Cuban hinterland, is a sardonic teller of tales-some taller than others-of slavery, revolution, family secrets, love, and identity, spanning four generations.

But one day Oscar wakes to find himself utterly alone in the world. As the sole descendant of his family line, he is not sure what to do or where he should go, but in the midst of this uncertainty, he holds fast to what his grandfather always told him: “No man knows who he is until he knows his past, his history, the history of his country.”

As Oscar sets out to find his ancestral village of Pata de Puerco and the meaning of the magical pig's-foot amulet he has inherited, the search for his country's hidden history becomes entangled with his search for the truth about himself and his family.

Ambitious in scope yet intimate in tone, full of dark comedy, magical history, and startling revelations, Pig's Foot is a dazzling evocation of Cuba's tumultuous history, and a spell-binding debut.

About this title

About the Author

Carlos Acosta was born in Havana in 1973 and trained at the Cuban National Ballet School. He has been a principal at the English National Ballet, the Houston Ballet, the American Ballet Theatre, and the Royal Ballet, and has danced as a guest artist all over the world, winning numerous awards. He is the author of the memoir No Way Home.

Frank Wynne has won four major prizes for his translations, including the IMPAC, the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize, and the Scott Moncrieff Prize.

From Booklist

Internationally acclaimed ballet dancer Acosta has encapsulated more than 100 years in the history of his native Cuba into a grandly entertaining debut novel. In 1995, while being interrogated for reasons not yet revealed, Oscar Mandinga spins a colorful yarn about his ancestors and the rustic backwater village they called home: Pata de Puerco, or “Pig’s Foot” in English. It begins with his great-grandfather and namesake, a pygmy of African heritage. He and his best friend, José, marry sisters, and their lives, and those of others they meet, play out against Cuba’s troubled political backdrop, from violent slave uprisings on a sugar plantation to the Spanish-American War to the Communist revolution and afterward. The younger Oscar’s tone is rough and sarcastic, and the tales he tells are often exaggerated, but underneath all the bluster are several tender stories of love and family and the gradual unfolding of his heartfelt search for identity. Pata de Puerco may exist solely within Acosta’s rich imagination, but its unique characters and their exploits will long resonate in readers’ minds. --Sarah Johnson

About this edition

• Publisher: Bloomsbury Paperbacks
• Publication date: 2015
• ISBN 10: 1408833727
• ISBN 13: 9781408833728
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 352