by Stephen Mateo. $18.99; AuthorHouse; 190 pages
When your father escapes Fascist Spain in 1946 by completing a journey across the Atlantic solo in a stolen sailboat, you've got golden material that clamors for an audience. Stephen Mateoan actor, fitness trainer and screenwriterset out to honor his father's story by doing just that.
He started first with a screenplay, hoping no doubt to capitalize on the large visual images and drama inherent in such a retelling. Perhaps to broaden audience appeal, Mateo (who is gay) made the hero's son character (based on himself) a straight man who is struggling to hold his relationship with his girlfriend together. Thus, there is no gay content in this appealing tale.
Mateo then rewrote his father's story as a novel, which is the form we have here. It is not clear exactly how much of the retelling is real. Presumably, he talked with his Papa to gather much of the story before Tomas Castellano passed away in 2009 at the age of 82. They made a publicity junket to the Canary Islands together in 2007 to launch the Spanish version of the book. The Canaries, a Spanish archipelago located just off the northwest coast of mainland Africa, is where the story began.
Mateo, it is clear, is a young man of enormous heart who encourages his readers to "never give up on your dreams," just as his Papa did not in escaping the Fascist regime to seek freedom across the Atlantic. In doing so, he left his family behind and in the dark as to what their son had done or what happened to him.
This book, whose story is so full of promise of a riveting and adventurous tale, is modestly told in simple prose. It is lacking in much of the detail that would have made Mateo's account of the crossing a thrilling read. What were more of the oppressive details, and the historical basis, for life's difficulties under the Fascists in the Canary Islands?
Interestingly,while the islands never saw a war with gunshots, deaths and heroic tales, the post-war repression was among the most severe in all of Spain (source: www.whattenerife.com ).
Then, too, what did Tomas, the young man whose story this is, do and think each day to pass the time as the boat drifted across the waters? How did he fight his fears and boredom? Mateo writes of his protagonist, "Tomas was forced to discover who he really was, and to confront his strengths as well as his weaknesses." More details would have been fascinating. He doesn't give us many. Perhaps screenplays are lighter in such descriptions, but Mateo would have enriched his readers' imagination more satisfyingly had he taken a little more time to dwell on such things in his novel version.
Nonetheless, a pleasant read about family love, immigrant struggles, and a man surviving incredible odds against nature.
Originally from Toronto, Mateo studied acting in L.A. He co-starred on the CBS sitcom High Society, has appeared off-Broadway and developed a cooking show for kids.