John J. Harrigan
hopes historical thriller helps readers understand decades of mistrust between
Cuba and U.S.
by Tesha M. Christensen
As Cuba opens back up to Americans, a local author is hoping
to help people understand what happened between the two countries five decades
ago.
“With President Obama’s initiative in opening up to Cuba,
‘Crosshairs on Castro’ is a timely book that I hope everyone will read,”
remarked John J. Harrigan.
His recently published historical thriller, “Crosshairs on
Castro,” weaves an assassination plot around the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis.
The book revolves around Army lieutenant Charlie Parnell, who
is blackmailed into the scheme by CIA rogue agents. Masquerading as an Irish
journalist, he enters Havana only to meet danger at every step. He must elude
his Cuban watcher, the tantalizing Isabel Fernandez, who learns his true
identity just as the crisis erupts. While she debates what to do, Castro
prepares for invasion, throwing Havana into chaos and cutting off Charlie’s
escape route. He and Isabel must scramble for their lives.
The book is available in either paperback ($12.95) or Kindle
($4.50) on Amazon.com. Locally, it can be purchased at the Underground Music
Cafe at 1759 Hamline Ave.
“In 1962, the Cuban Missile Crisis came within an eyelash of
destroying the bulk of Western Civilization in a cascade of nuclear blasts,”
observed Harrigan. “Throughout much of the 1960s and 1970s, the CIA devoted
enormous energy trying to assassinate Fidel Castro. What I did was create a
fictional assassination story and weave it around the real life historical
drama of the Missile Crisis. Nobody has ever done this before.”
Harrigan added that these events of 1962 may have happened
long ago, but they did a lot to shape the long half-century of distrust between
the two societies.
“We can’t remove that distrust unless we understand why it
happened. ‘Crosshairs on Castro’ uses historical fiction to address that
issue,” stated Harrigan.
ADDICTED TO HISTORICAL FICTION
This is Harrigan’s third historical novel.
“I’m addicted to historical fiction,” admitted the Falcon
Heights resident.
Harrigan earned a Ph.D. from Georgetown University. He spent
30 years at Hamline University where he taught political science, chaired the
department, served as assistant dean of Liberal Arts, and authored several
textbooks.
“When the chance for early retirement appeared, I grabbed it
in order to learn the craft of writing historical thrillers,” said Harrigan.
His debut thriller, “Patron Saint of Desperate Situations,”
was praised as “excellent” by the St. Paul Pioneer Press in 2007.
“The Patron Saint of Desperate Situations” is built
around the plane crash that killed iconic U.S. Senator Paul Wellstone. His
second novel, “The Jeeptown Sock Hop” is an exploration of the homelife during
the Korean War of the early 1950s, seen from the eyes of a white boy who falls
for a black girl in a town deeply split by racial and class divisions.
“One thread links these stories,” remarked Harrigan. “I want
to help people feel what it was like to live through these critical
moments. Histories can tell us what happened in the past, but only novels and
movies can get us to feel what it was like.”
EXPERIENCE ENHANCES NOVELS
Earlier in his career, Harrigan spent three years in Rio de
Janeiro, Brazil as a U.S. Foreign Service cultural affairs officer. “I loved
Brazil and would go back in a heartbeat if I had a good reason to go,” said
Harrigan. He still speaks Portuguese fluently, has close Brazilian friends,
reads the literature, and listens to the music. Harrigan also taught courses on
Brazilian movies for Hamline’s senior OLLI program.
The heroine of his first novel is a Brazilian immigrant
single mom living in Minnesota who is devastated by Wellstone’s death. A
somewhat minor character in his second novel “Jeeptown Sock Hop” is a nun from
Cape Verde with a Portuguese accent who has a huge impact on the novel’s
15-year-old protagonist. The heroine of “Crosshairs on Castro” is a young
Cuban mother.
“Without my experience in Latin America, I never could have
created these characters,” noted Harrigan.
ADVICE FOR ASPIRING NOVELISTS
Harrigan advises aspiring novelists to keep writing and
submitting their pieces to appropriate venues.
But most of all, he encourages them to seek feedback.
“I’ve found an invaluable source of critiques in the
Minneapolis Writers’ Guild,” said Harrigan. “Local authors can submit pieces to
us. If we have openings and the work holds some promise, we will critique it.”
In exchange, the
authors also have to critique other peoples’ writings.
“It’s amazing how much one can learn in the process of
critiquing somebody else,” remarked Harrigan. “Having a first rate group like
this examine your work is infinitely more useful than paying several hundred
dollars to some ‘expert’ to review it.”
He recommends using the Meetup website as a starting place
for finding local critique groups.
“Whether it’s an epic poem or an article on a local sport’s
team, you simply have to strive to write the most compelling piece that you
can,” said Harrigan.
He is polishing off his next book, “Spiderwoman,” a
thriller-caper built around a woman’s reaction to her soldier-son’s death in
the Iraqi War.
Harrigan and his wife Sandy met while he lived along Hewitt
in the Midway. They split their time between St. Paul and Bonita Springs, Fla.,
and work hard to remain a presence in the lives of their four adult sons and
their children.
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