Grab a Snake by the Tail
Leonardo Padura
Translated by Peter Bush
In this new crime novel from Leonardo Padura, Cuba’s most celebrated living author, Police Inspector Mario Conde investigates a murder in the Barrio Chino, the rundown Chinatown of Havana.
Pedro Cuang is found hanging from a beam in his dingy room.One finger cut off, and the outline of two arrows carved on his chest. Was this a ritual Santería killing or a just a sordid settling of accounts among drug traffickers beginning to infiltrate Cuba in the 1980s? The Barrio Chino is not Conde’s usual beat, but when he is asked to take on the case by the alluring Police Lieutenant Patricia Chion, he finds her hard to resist.
