A review by tinalynne577
The Most Beautiful Girl in Cuba by Chanel Cleeton

3.0

The Most Beautiful Girl in Cuba by Chanel Cleeton is a historical fiction set in the late 1800s, told from the point of view of three different women: Grace, Evangeline and Marina. Grace is a plucky reporter in NYC, while the other two women live in Cuba and are caught up in the turmoil between Cuba and Spain. Eventually the three women’s stories become intertwined.

I appreciate historical fiction books based on real-life events, and this is a part of history I don’t know much about, but I found the paragraphs full of historical information rather dry and ended up skim-reading them after a while. I think, while historically accurate, the author could have spent a little more time adding to the depth of her characters. The storylines of Marina and Evangeline were both heart-wrenching ones, but I didn’t feel as invested as I should have been.

While this is considered the fourth book in the Perez Family series, I think it stands alone just fine. I have read the first, but it’s been so many years that I’ve forgotten the details. Having said that, if you haven’t read this author before, start with Next Year in Havana instead of this one.

Thank you to Berkley Publishing Group and Netgalley for an egalley of this book in exchange for an honest review.