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A Haunting in Hialeah Gardens
Raul Palma
Dutton
October 2023
On Sale: October 3, 2023
288 pages ISBN: 059347211X EAN: 9780593472118 Kindle: B0BRMBLG3L Hardcover / e-Book
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Fantasy Magical Realism | Fiction Literary
A genre-bending debut with a fiercely political
heart, A Haunting in Hialeah
Gardens explores the weight of the devil’s
bargain, following the lengths one man will go to for the
promise of freedom.
Hugo
Contreras’s world in Miami has shrunk. Since his wife
died, Hugo’s debt from her medical bills has become
insurmountable. He shuffles between his efficiency
apartment, La Carreta (his favorite place for a cafecito),
and a botanica in a strip mall where he works as the
resident babaláwo. One day,
Hugo’s nemesis calls. Alexi Ramirez is a debt
collector who has been hounding Hugo for years, and Hugo
assumes this call is just more of the same. Except this time
Alexi is calling because he needs spiritual help. His house
is haunted. Alexi proposes a deal: If Hugo can successfully
cleanse his home before Noche Buena, Alexi will forgive
Hugo’s debt. Hugo reluctantly accepts, but
there’s one issue: Despite being a babaláwo, he
doesn’t believe in spirits. Hugo
plans to do what he’s done with dozens of clients
before: use sleight of hand and amateur psychology to
convince Alexi the spirits have departed. But when the job
turns out to be more than Hugo bargained for, Hugo’s
old tricks don’t work. Memories of his past—his
childhood in the Bolivian silver mines and a fraught
crossing into the United States as a boy—collide with
Alexi’s demons in an explosive climax. Equal parts hilarious and heartbreaking, A
Haunting in Hialeah Gardens explores questions of
visibility, migration, and what we owe—to ourselves,
our families, and our histories.
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