That David Grann Story's Got It All

“Morgan handed Cherne a 1946 five-centavo coin. Its edge had a small notch. If Cherne wanted to send someone to see him in the future, he should give that person the coin for presentation to Morgan — a sign of trustworthiness.”
 — If you have been wondering whether or not to invest the time it takes to read all 21,563 words of David Grann’s article in this week’s New Yorker

about William Alexander Morgan, the Toledo, Ohio-born Cuban revolutionary known as “El Americano,” I encourage you to do so. (Subscription NOT required to read it through that link.) I finished it this morning and it is fascinating and thrilling and heartbreaking. The Mob, the C.I.A., guerilla warfare, espionage! Castro, Guevara, Trujillo! Hoover, Lansky, Kennedy! But it’s really a love story. It reads like something out of Hemingway, or Graham Greene (both of whom are cited). Or Warren Zevon, who, strangely, is not.