Beautiful Maria of My Soul

Includes a Reading Group Guide.

• "I fell instantly in love with the glorious soul of Beautiful Maria of my Soul. Hijuelos has created and brought to life two beloved characters, a heart-stealing heroine and Havana during an epoch of changing life."
  Amy Tan, bestselling author of The Joy Luck Club and The Kitchen God's Wife
• "Beautiful Maria is the Queen of the Mambo Kings! Oscar Hijuelos brings this magnificent character to life in this lyrical novel."
  Gay Talese, author of A Writer's Life
• "[A] warm, exuberant triumph . . . Savor the mysterious power of a master's pentimento."
  Los Angeles Times
• "It takes a lot of nerve and skill to pull off something as rich as Beautiful Maria of my Soul, but pull it off as Hijuelos does."
  Cleveland Plain Dealer
• "An intelligent and playful ending caps off a vivid story that should delight readers of The Mambo Kings and enthrall those new to Hijuelos's imaginative and florid voice."
  Publishers Weekly
• "Vividly evokes the vibrant lost world of prerevolutionary Havana, the Cuban Revolution, and modern-day Miami . . . a welcome expansion on the much-loved The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love, as well as a finely written novel in its own right."
  Bookmarks magazine
• “Ultimately, these final encounters achieve a complex intimacy that has been decades in coming, born of palpable yearning, as is apt in a book that is, after all, named for a song of love.”
  Chattanooga Free Press
• “An affecting portrait of broken dreams and regret, hope and despair, rediscovery and renewal, Beautiful María ties up the loose ends of a love story that died with Nestor in The Mambo Kings, but is still very much alive in the heart and soul of his song, 'Beautiful María.'"
  Bookpage
• “ A Cuba-set tale of sex, beauty, and dancing, the vibrant sequel to The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love will guarantee you’re Havana good time this summer.”
  Entertainment Weekly
• "A musically infused tale reflecting the boleros’ themes of love and longing.”
  AARP