To Kill a Cockroach

To kill a 'faggot' is no different than killing a roach," the author writes in his book -To Kill a Cockroach. The author uses the words he heard as a child with painstaking precision. In her Pulitzer prize book, To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee depicts the cruelty in a fictional racist town in America in the 1930s. -where the innocent are preyed on because of the color of their skin. In To Kill a Cockroach, the author struggles with the same kind of hatred Lee vividly portrays in her story. In the Cuban diaspora, the author heard, in words and actions, that homosexuals were no better than a roach. Not unlike Lee's fictional town of Maycombe, Alabama, Miami was rampant with prejudice and hatred. The Cuban Revolution, the hostility against his homosexuality, the devastation of AIDS, and the search for self-love are at the core of this memoir. The writer takes the readers through his journey to survive the unsurvivable. The reader will be inspired by Osvaldo's relentless spiritual journey toward self-love, where nature and animals become his refuge.
"Intense and full of emotion, this autobiography of a man and an artist will captivate the reader with its message of hope, improvement, and celebration of existence despite all obstacles. It is a vivid book."
-Jose Luis Piquero-