On the surface, Beatriz Perez is a gorgeous 22-year-old society woman gliding through a cycle of parties, gossip and marriage proposals along with the other moneyed elite in 1960s Palm Beach, Florida. But beneath her cool exterior burns a pure, sharp desire for revenge. In Chanel Cleeton's When We Left Cuba, we learn that Beatriz and her family (including sister Elisa, protagonist of Cleeton's Next Year in Havana) left Cuba after Fulgencio Batista was overthrown, Fidel Castro took power and her sugar-magnate father's land was seized by the government. 

The Perezes moved to Palm Beach in hopes of finding a sense of safety, rebuilding the family fortune and, to Beatriz's unending frustration, marrying off the unwed daughters. She has much bigger plans—like, say, taking down Castro so she can go home to her beloved Cuba. Thanks to her still-privileged social position and her strong bond with Eduardo, a family friend and revolutionary, she's actually got a chance at doing so. Eduardo introduces her to a CIA agent who sees her as a good bet: She's fierce and smart, anger has made her reckless, and her social status gives her plausibility.

But there's a complicating factor. Beatriz and Nicholas—a smart, sexy senator-to-be—meet at a fancy party, and their chemistry is immediate and electric. Alas, he's engaged, an arrangement orchestrated by two families that want political and financial benefits from the union. Beatriz and Nicholas understand each other on that level and so many others, from the political to the personal to the physical. But amid the aftermath of war and continued upheaval in the U.S. and Cuba, plus divergent views on how best to achieve their goals, being together often feels impossible.

An edifying, entertaining read filled with adventure, suspense, history and romance, When We Left Cuba is a thought-provoking look at the ways in which politics can be intensely personal.

Cleeton (Next Year in Havana) will break hearts with this exquisitely wrought tale of a privileged girl exiled from her country and the powerful American politician who changes the course of her life. After Fidel Castro took power in Cuba, Beatriz Perez and her family sought refuge in Palm Beach, Fla., and tried to rebuild. But Beatriz craves revenge: the Cuban leader was responsible for her twin brother's murder, and she believes that—with the help of a fellow exile, Eduardo Diaz, and her recruitment into the CIA—she can avenge that death. When U.S. Senator Nicholas Randolph Preston III enters her world at a Palm Beach society ball, she loses her heart quickly to the man who will change her life. Cleeton's twisting, intricate plot of love and revenge takes Beatriz to such locations as Harlem and London (where she faces off with a trained Cuban intelligence officer) and finally to a potentially deadly meeting with Castro in Cuba. Tiny glimpses of the present day are woven throughout the novel, giving readers hints of what became of two idealistic souls. This is a beautiful and utterly transporting novel. Agent: Kevan Lyon, Marsal Lyon Literary Agency. (Apr.)