A Writer’s Escape From Cuba

Anonymous Patron writes “Tom Nolan in today’s Wall Street Journal recounts Jose Latour’s escape from Cuba. You might say Mr. Latour wrote his way to freedom. His vehicle was crime fiction, a genre he fell in love with as a youngster in pre-revolutionary 1950s Havana, reading PocketBook paperbacks left behind by American tourists patronizing the barbershop and beauty parlor run by his aunt in the Hotel Nacional. “That’s how I discovered Erle Stanley Gardner . . . Shell Scott. . . the Ellery Queen pair of authors,” Mr. Latour said. “And the absolute master of crime-noir . . . Raymond Chandler.””